122 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



rearing animals or impro'ving their stock in this way. "Whether: 

 they arc right in this, is matter for serious consideration. My 

 own impression is that the State bounty, so liberally offered to 

 each society, was originally intended to be offered on stock of 

 our own rearing within the State, if not the county in which it 

 is offered. No animal can take a premium in Worcester County 

 unless it be wholly the product of the county. This may be 

 selfish ; but it is the only way that a valuable race of animals 

 can be perpetuated or improved, to my knowledge. This buying 

 foreign stock from a foreign state has undoubtedly been induced 

 by the presumed enhanced profits of supplying our markets 

 with fresh milk instead of manufacturing it into butter, and the 

 consequence is a large portion of our phosphates go to market 

 never to be returned, in shape of what would be skimmed milk 

 for rearing our best young calves or feeding swine. My own 

 conclusion is, that this practice of oflering premiums for other 

 than stock of our rearing, does not have a tendency to 

 promote the object our government had in view. It was stated 

 at the dinner table by Mr. Lawson, I think, of Lowell, that he 

 had imported two cows recently from the Isle of Jersey, of pure 

 blood, and by repeated trials had obtained one pound of butter 

 from four quarts of milk from the one he kept, and his neighbor 

 who owned the other, had succeeded as often in making one 

 pound and one ounce from the same quantity of milk. This 

 statement undoubtedly is correct, as no one has ever contra- 

 dicted it to my knowledge. Be it so ; whilst from the best 

 information that I can obtain, as an average of all the mongrel 

 or accidental coavs in the State, it takes eleven quarts of milk 

 for a pound of butter. If we take the last census as evidence, 

 we find the value of live stock in the United States to be far 

 greater than all the manufacturing and mercantile interest put 

 together. Yet who has ever heard of a legislatui-e, either state 

 or national, spending a breath of talk, or bestowing a thought on 

 the breeding and rearing of a pure race of cattle that will give 

 us certain results ? The attention of the Board of Agriculture 

 is most earnestly, though respectfully, called to this sulyect. 

 And I am free to confess that, in my opinion, the State's bounty 

 is not doing its intended work in many of the societies to 

 which it is so liberally bestowed. 



