2C0 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



in somewhat of a philosophical sense, endeavoring, however, to keep within 

 bounds of tiiose facts which men of experience have proved to be the ground 

 work of success in breeding ; but it is figures, dollars and cents, that con- 

 vince the average farmer. Before attempting such an array of evidence, 

 I wish to remark that there is danger of attributing too much to ''blood." 

 It is too often assumed that if we have the right breed we need not be particu- 

 lar about the feed. 



While the pure-breeds under proper management yield bountiful returns, 

 with poor management they will speedily degenerate and give unsatisfactory 

 returns. America has few epicureans, our resources are yet so great we are 

 not compelled to concentrate our articles of consumption, beyond a very mod- 

 erate degree. With most men, so to speak, "meat is meat, and milk is 

 milk," so while I have very decided private views, I will not directly invite 

 discussion upon quality. 1 believe that the grand principle in stock raising is 

 to produce an animal that meets our demands at the earliest age possible. I 

 have no idea of a breed that can do this under systems of starvation economy. 

 We must learn that it is more profitable to feed 20 bushels of corn in 8 months 

 and receive 200 pounds of fat pork, than it is to feed 20 bushels of corn in 18 

 months and receive 200 pounds of lean meat. And no one who has ever bred 

 natives, or American breeds of swine, under our local systems of agriculture, 

 and then one of the improved English breeds, will doubt that this expresses 

 the true relations of these breeds. I do not consider that the true value of a 

 pure-breed, as regards the regular farmer, is at all embodied ii#the preserva- 

 tion of its purity among his general stock, but it lies in the preservation of its 

 purity in the breeding males of his stock. It is almost universally conceded 

 that it is possible to rear a herd of grades, which, for every purpose other than 

 that of breeding from, is equal to, and often superior to, the pure breed. 



Departing abruptly from the preceding method of treating of my subject, it 

 is of interest to note that in 1868, according to an estimate made by L. F. 

 Allen, the hei'dsman's interests in the United States were based upon an 

 annual slaughter of five millions of cattle; in 1880, Hon. T. J. Megibben, in 

 his presidential message before the American Association of Short-born 

 breeders, estimated the annual slaughter of cattle in the United States at ten 

 millions, worth an average of §40 per head ; this represents an increase of 100 

 per cent in thirteen years. From Mr. Megibben' s estimate I will improvise 

 an example, which may crudely represent the present importance of pure-bred 

 cattle. The average price of native cattle in Chicago for 1879 was $1.62 per 

 hundred weight, which was but 46 per cent of the average price of medium 

 grades. Upon the hypothesis that one-half of the cattle slaughtered in the 

 United States will rank as natives, I deduce the following : Forty dollars 

 represents the average price of two animals, one a grade worth 100 per cent, 

 one a native worth 46 per cent; $40, therefore, is the arithmetical mean of 

 100 per cent and 46 per cent, which is 73 per cent ; then 1 per cent equals 

 one-seventy-third of l?40, equals 80.5479, and 100 per cent, the value of the 

 grade, equals $54. 19, and 46 per cent, the value of the native, equals $25.20. 



Much to the injustice of the grades, we must now consider the natives 

 equal in weight to the grades. Upon this base we find one grade worth in 

 Chicago $29.59 more than a native. Chicago live-stock markets very fairly 

 represent the leading markets of the United States, through which probably 

 one-half of all the cattle in the United States are marketed, the other one-half 

 being marketed in villages, where comparatively no distinction of prices is 

 made in different types of animals. Then the true difference in the value of 



