198 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



or visiting his neighbors, or at the farm club meetings, he 

 will become more perfect : it will awaken a subject of con- 

 stant interest, and, above all, will put money in his purse by 

 the decided improvement to his herd and the yield there- 

 from. It does not interfere with any of your favorite modes 

 of judging stock, it only adds a new one, — a valuable assist- 

 ant. An adjunct to all other modes, it harmonizes with, 

 and proves to yourself and others, the accuracy of your judg- 

 ment. And it will enable you to avoid buying the short 

 milkers, and help you to weed out the cows now standing 

 in your stables, eating their heads off, and being a source of 

 loss to you the longer they are kept. "With the book in 

 hand, go through your herd, and test them, and consign 

 twenty-five per cent of your herd to the butcher. 



I have observed, that, in the questions that have been 

 asked at these very interesting meetings, something has been 

 said in regard to the importance of the sire in breeding. 

 There is one of the great advantages of this system. Ordi- 

 narily, a bull is preserved and kept, because he is good-look- 

 ing, well-shaped, or something of that kind, when, perhaps, 

 he has not the first characteristic for producing good milk- 

 ing animals. We all know that we are often disappointed 

 when the animals we have raised come into milk, and of 

 course there has been a great deal of loss. That animal 

 must be sent to the shambles, because it would not pay to 

 keep her. But if a bull has a good escutcheon, fine oily 

 skin, and fine soft hair, then you may know that he is worth 

 keeping and breeding from. I shall be glad to answer any 

 question that any person wishes to ask. 



Question. What is the appearance of the escutcheon in 

 the male, and its extent ? How are we to judge of the male ? 



Mr. Hazard. It has not been my fortune ever to see an 

 escutcheon of v the full size given in Guenon's books. In my 

 book I have reproduced the drawing of the escutcheon of 

 the bull. It is always very much smaller in the male than 

 it is in the female ; and I find that the prevailing one is the 

 curved-line escutcheon, which is a very excellent one. You 

 will always see the escutcheon on a bull, if he has it, as 

 plainly as you will on a cow. You will see it if it is there ; 

 hut you will not see it as large as on the cow. Guenon, 



