REARING STOCK CALVES. 275 



trary has been ineffective. Our own credulity has been exer- 

 cised in various trials of the kind, only to convince us of the 

 folly of pursuing them, and on comparing notes with experi- 

 enced breeders, who have also tried various methods, our conclu- 

 sions have been alike. In some years, to be sure, we have had 

 a preponderance of one sex, in calves, over the other ; in another 

 year it would be reversed; but on an average of several years, 

 the sexes were about equal, yet differing in proportion, within the 

 same neighborhoods. There may have been peculiar hidden 

 influences to control the result in a given herd, of one year 

 beyond another ; but as no human observation has yet arrived at 

 a certainty in its solution, we may more wisely let it alone, and 

 be content with what nature gives us, being careful, by our own 

 attention, that it be as good as possible, of its kind. 



