304 AMERICAN CATTLE. 



cattle come up in such condition as they may happen to be from 

 the fullness, or scantiness of the summer and fall pastures, young, 

 and old, good, bad, and indifferent mixed together. The fodder 

 is pitched from the stacks, and strewn over the yards, or fields 

 or what is worse, the stacks themselves left to be foraged upon 

 by the cattle running loose around them. Much of the food is 

 trampled into the mud, or slush of snow and water lying around, 

 and altogether lost. Some of it is eaten by the ravenous animals, 

 as they hunch, hook, and drive each other away from a cleaner 

 morsel before them, while all the time they are subjected to the 

 changes, vicissitudes, and severities of every storm that occurs, 

 through a tedious winter of several months. The consequence 

 of all this is, that through irregularity of feeding, and careless- 

 ness in distributing their food, and want of shelter, the cattle 

 lose flesh every day, and be their condition what it may on 

 coming into winter quarters, they go out "spring poor," or "on 

 the lift," with no growth whatever in the young stock, and just 

 about strength enough in such as have survived their wretched 

 poverty of condition, to crawl out into their spring pastures ! 



This may be thought an overdrawn statement; but it is no 

 exaggeration of numberless instances which have occurred under 

 our own eye. Surely no practice can be worse than this for 

 the welfare and comfort of the poor suffering cattle, nor for 

 the profit of the farmer. There is no profit in it. Land so 

 stocked and managed, pays little, or nothing, and cattle so 

 utterly neglected can be of little value. No goodness of quality 

 can be expected in them, while disease, arising from neglect and 

 poverty, is always making inroads on their numbers. Every 

 spring, our cattle markets are filled with the wretched rubbish 

 driven from such herds. We have seen thousands of them 

 annually, at our large railway cattle yards, and the wonder is 

 that they find purchasers at any price above absolute ruin to 

 their owners. 



