194 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



sylvania Commission. "We have invariably noticed, where 

 there are large, knotty milk-veins, so called, particularly 

 when there are two on the belly, and the udder is covered 

 with prominent zig-zag veins, and these extend up on the 

 perinseum, that that cow is a first-rate cow, and, as such, she 

 has a first-class escutcheon. 



Professor Arnold, the highest authority in this country on 

 dairying matters, quotes Monsieur Magne, and adds, — 



" The size of the escutcheon is regarded as the measure of the quan- 

 tity of blood supplied to the milk-producing vessels, and is evidence of 

 their capability of elaborating milk. In the same way, the veins take 

 up the blood, and carry it back in the milk-veins, which pass through 

 the bag, and along the belly, and enter the body through one or more 

 holes on their way to the heart. The size of the milk-veins, and the 

 holes where they enter the body, vary with the escutcheon, and, like it, 

 give evidence of the quantity of venous blood passing away from and 

 through the udder, and they have the same significance with reference to 

 quantity as the supply of arterial blood and the size of the escutcheon." 



He adds, — 



"But none of these indications, taken singly, is an infallible evidence 

 of large yield. They must be considered together. A large escutcheon 

 and milk-veins, coupled with a small stomach, would be marked down 

 at least one-half of what they might otherwise signify ; and a large 

 digestive apparatus, coupled with small milk-veins and escutcheon, should 

 be marked down in the same way. Keeping the leading indications in 

 view, observation will soon enable one to make close estimates." 



Dr. D. E. Salmon, one of the ablest veterinarians in this 

 country, has discussed this question in a very clear manner. 

 I have printed his article in my Handbook, from which I 

 quote the following, though such fragments of his argument 

 do not do him or it justice : — 



" The mammary artery sends several divisions to the tissue of the 

 udder, and is prolonged between the thighs by a perineal branch, which 

 terminates in the inferior commissure of the vulva, after having fur- 

 nished glandular and cutaneous divisions. . . . 



" Magne's facts are correct, then, whether his inferences are or not. 

 The same artery that supplies the udder with blood supplies the skin on which 

 the escutcheon is formed ; and, more than this, the artery ramifies in the direc- 

 tion in which the hair of the escutcheon grows." 



Dr. Salmon then quotes Erasmus Wilson to show the 

 direction of the hairs on the anterior surface of the human 



