NEAT STOCK. 177 



the natural increase and importation, mnst be now many hun- 

 dreds, and tlie demand for them is increasing. 



West Roxbuet. 



[The following report has been forwarded to the trustees by 

 tlie committee on Dairy Herds of not less than six cows, for 

 which the Massachusetts Society for the Promotion of Agricul- 

 ture offered premiums, to be competed for jointly by Plymouth 

 and Barnstable counties.] 



No one person presented six cows for premium, in Barnstable 

 county, leaving the field to two competitors in Plymouth county, 

 Mr. Sidney Packard, of East Bridgewater, and Mr. J. L. Bas- 

 sett, of Bridgewater, who presented each six cows, owned by 

 them more than six months previous to the exhibition, and in 

 all respects complying with the conditions required. Confined 

 as we are to these two competitors, the committee were much 

 gratified to find even two herds of dairy stock in the county so 

 wisely selected for size and adaptation to the soil and circum- 

 stances of the owners. If they did not make as much show as the 

 larger and more prominent stocks, they were better calculated 

 for good returns at the end of the year. Mr. J. L. Bassett's 

 cows were well selected and bore marks of judgment and ex- 

 perience. They were raised in Kennebec county, Maine, and 

 notwithstanding they are native stock, except two which have 

 some Durham blood, they boar evident marks of being descended 

 from a bull imported by Benjamin Vaughan, Esq., some fifty or 

 more years since. These cows have not been high bred or liigh 

 fed. The fault of Mr. Bassett has been in keeping them in 

 winter exclusively on corn-fodder, oat straw, and meadow hay, 

 cruel feed in winter for milch cows. Mr. Bassett's statement, 

 which is enclosed, says the average yield of milk of his cows, 

 for the first eight days in June, was twenty-six and three-fourths 

 pounds, the average eight days in September twenty-four and 

 three-fourths pounds, or equal to about twelve quarts of milk 

 per day for each cow, with no feed but grass, his pasture none 

 of the best. These cows were intended for making butter, rather 

 than for large quantity of milk, the quantity of butter he has 

 not stated. I think he said some of them made ten pounds a 

 week, or more. If he had kept his cows better during winter, 



they would have made him more butter in summer. Mr. Sid- 

 23 * 



