THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



357 



proposition means anylliiug, it means of course that 

 Bates animals arf disposed to ripen more rapidly tlian 

 aninials oftlic Booth tribes. I should have no hesitation 

 in ilisputiugthe proposition. Let two animals, one of each 

 class of blood, and both of the same age, be brought together", 

 let them be treated exactly in the same way ; fed at the 

 same times, and with the same sort of food; let the cir. 

 cumstances of their existence be in every respect similar; 

 and, granting that the " quality" of the Bates animal was 

 superior to that of her companion — which of the two (I 

 appeal to experienced observers for an answer) would 

 come out, at the end let us say of two years, the largest, 

 tlie fattest, the hea\-iest; and which would be worth the 

 most money to the butcher? 



I am, Sir, respectfully yours, 



R. F. HOVSMAN. 



r.S. — Since this letter was written (in November 

 last), the Stackhouse Herd has undergone some 

 changes. Eosey has been sold to Lady Pigot, and Fa- 

 miliar 2nd to Mr. Storer. Both have produced heifer 

 calves to Valasco; that of Familiar (a white one named 

 Oriana) being retained at Stackhouse. Barmaid has 

 yielded a very good white heifer, Mrs. Quickly, to the 

 same bull ; Fai-ewell (for whom Mr. Carr refused an 

 ofter of 100 guineas since she calved) twin roan heifers of 



great promise, Chrlstabel and Claiibel ; whilst Lady of 

 the Valley has presented her owner with a rich roan bull, 

 I'rince of the Blood. But the most important changes 

 which have taken place in Mr. Carr's herd are made by the 

 addition of Bonnet, Prince ss Helena, and Princess Louise, 

 all of them recently ob;;aaed from Mr. Wood of C^astle 

 Grove at large prices. For Bonnet, now neai-ly seventeen 

 years old, a sum of £80 was paid, double the price she 

 fetched at the Killerby sale in 1853. Princess Helena, 

 two years old, was secured at a cost of £.375 ; and Princess 

 Louise, calved last June, £250. These heifers are out of 

 Bustle, Bonnet's daughter; Princess Helena being by 

 Prince Arthur, and Princess Loirise by King Arthur, the son 

 of Venus Victrix. Princess Helena is a well-grown and 

 most admirable animal, bearing a curiously close resem- 

 blance to her cousin Lady of the Valley ; and her sister 

 Princess Louise, a rich roan, gives promise of mature ex- 

 cellences. Mr. Carr now possesses eight animals of tlie 

 Bonnet fiimily— Bonnet, Wide-awake, Lady of the Valley, 

 Windsor's Queen, Princess Helena, Princess Louise, Lady 

 Windsor, and Prince of the Blood. Mr. Wood has only one 

 of the Bonnet tribe left— Bustle ; but he still retains his 

 famous Norma family, of which the only two sold (one to 

 Captain Spencer, and the other to Jlr. Douglas) have been 

 greatly distinguished. 

 Lwie Bank, Lancaster, March 20, 18C1, 



OUR OLD AUTHORS ON SHEEP-ROT. 



AccorJicg to the old proverb, " Every tub must stand upon 

 its own bottom." la no department is this more true than in 

 farming. Fallen humanity may be fond of the marvellous, 

 but witchcraft has long since been excluded from every branch 

 of husbandry. A liver fluke, although it baa been considered 

 amougst the nearest approaches to " spontaneous generation," 

 has, nevertheless, its own natural history, Man, and the va- 

 rious animals of the lower creation, to whose hepatic organs 

 Nature has assigned it (the fluke) a rightful habitation, have 

 each their own natural history, so that in this respect there is 

 a common footing of equality between them. 



It may be humbling for some proud hearts to think that 

 flukes should swarm in tbeii gall-bladders ; but there they are, 

 under certain pathological circumstances, in ugly numbers, to 

 apeak for thcmselvcB &nd the natural family to which they 

 belong. 



It is not by eating whil-rots, penny-worts, sanicle, bugle, 

 ])utter-wort3, sun-dews, and louse-worts, or grass in low marshy 

 meadows "of a morning before the dew is off," that is 

 the cause of fluke in the liver of man ; nor is it any of the 

 olher causes assigned for rot by the various writers quoted in 

 a previous article. Moreover, this conclusion is equally ob- 

 vious in the cases of such of the lower animals icfested with 

 fluke, but wbich are not subject to the causes said to produce 

 this entozoon in sheep, while the sheep itself often experiences 

 rot and fluke when housefed similar to rabbits, pigs, and 

 poultry. More does not require to be said to justify the dis- 

 missal of all the causes quoted, as being unsatisfactory, and 

 that the presence of fluke in the livers of sheep is to be 

 accounted for by a natural law peculiar to itself and the family 

 of animals to which it belongs. It would not be more absurd to 

 say that sheep were produced in Wales by the clouds that 

 hang on Saowdou's top, than it is to say that flukes are pro- 



duced in sheep's livers by eating grass " of a morning before 

 the dew is ofF." 



But, although the causes assigned are not the primary ones, 

 they may, nevertheless, be the proximate causes of that stage 

 of the disease known amongst practical farmers as " the rot." 

 If we can show satisfactory data for this — and we aver the facts 

 of the case furnish ample materials for doing so — then we shall 

 be able to reconcile the conclusions of the agricultural writers, 

 shepherds, and others quoted, with the laws of Nature to 

 which fluke and the animals it infests are both subject. We 

 will at the same time clear away a vast amount of rubbish 

 that now lies in the way of this important branch of hus- 

 bandry, sheep management being based upon a scientific and 

 solid foundation ; for if the sheep is subject to one code of 

 Nature's laws, aud the liver-fluke to another code of Nature's 

 laws, and if the two codes are opposed, the one to the other, 

 then the practical conclusion is manifest that we must take 

 steps consistent with 'Nature's laws to prevent the latter code, 

 the one favourable to the formation and development of fluke, 

 from coming into operation. In other words, we have to study 

 closely the natural history of the sheep, and to remove all ob- 

 stacles that stand in the way of that code of Nature's laws 

 to which it is subject having free operation. It is not enough 

 that we prevent the formation of fluke in the liver, for we 

 must at the same time promote the highest development and 

 state of well-being of the sheep. In point of fact, the latter is 

 tJie shepherd's proposition, for it is sheep that farmers should 

 breed, and sheep only. With the breeding of liver-fluke they 

 ought to have nothing to do. 



"That disease in sheep which has from time immemorial been 

 known to farmers, aud designated by them as "rot," is not 

 the first stage of a disease, nor the second, but that stage when 

 it assumes a certain form — viz., rollenne^s, (We purposely 



