VERMONT DAIRYMEN S ASSOCIATIOM. 1 19 



into paroxysms of anger and reached such a condition that 

 their milk produced spasms in their babies. These things are 

 traced back to the nervous system, and the udder here is tied 

 to the brain. Insanity in women is often due to derangements 

 of this character. The action of the udder is a mammary 

 function, it is united with the womb by a net work of nerves. 

 Here you have a marvelous piece of machinerv. That nervous 

 supply must be connected well with the structure of the back 

 and brain, and that is one of the first things I look for : Is 

 the cow well supplied with abundant nervous strength and 

 power ? If she is not I know she is built above and beyond 

 her power to endure. She must have a strong constitution 

 and abundant nervous power to do her work. 



The udder is a nerve organ, a mass of cells ; it is actually 

 producing the milk as you milk it. As you sit down and 

 milk, the udder is filled with a fluid but it is not milk, only 

 then does the nervous process and the action of the sympa- 

 thetic nervous system begin to operate and that fluid to trans- 

 form into milk. Many men have noticed a peculiar phenom- 

 enon connected with the cow. The cow will hold up her 

 milk ; put a calf to her, let her feel the mouth of the calf and 

 she gives down her milk at once. The sympathetic psycho- 

 logical flow from the calf to the mother is seen at once. The 

 milker is often a very poor substitute for the calf. The mo- 

 ment the mouth of the babe touches the breast of the mother 

 there is established the psychological circulation between the 

 two and all the functions set to work in harmony with their 

 purpose. What does it teach us? It teaches us that the man 

 who sits down to milk this cow should establish sympathetic 

 relations with the cow. 



Let me tell you something of a Jersey heifer I have. She 

 is a grand-daughter of a famous old bull, Ike Felch. I 

 bought his last daughter, in .1885. She proved to be a won- 

 derful cow. She aborted her first three calves but had no 

 trouble after that. She would make me 600 pounds ofbutter a 

 year. She died when ten years old with a broken hip. Her 

 last daughter I have today. This Jersey heifer brought me a 

 calf the 10th day of last January. I bred that heifer to her 

 own brother in order to save twenty-five per cent of the blood 

 of the old bull in the resulting heifer, and I want to tell you 

 what that two 3-ear old heifer did last year. 



I commenced testing her on the 10th day of January — the 

 calf was dropped the f>th — and she gave me from the 10th day 

 of January to the 12th day of November 6794 pounds of milk 

 with her first calf. The average test for the year was a little 

 over five per cent -that made 396*4 pounds of butter from a 

 two year old heifer. 



