APPENDIX. 



THE FREE MARTIN. 



Cows usually bring forth but one calf at a birth ; 

 occasionally, however, they produce twins. John Hunter, 

 in his ' Observations on the Animal Economy/ says : " It 

 is a fact known, and I believe almost universally under- 

 stood, that when a cow brings forth two calves, one of 

 them a bull-calf, and the other to appearance a cow, 

 that the cow-calf is unfit for propagation ; but the bull- 

 calf grows up into a very proper bull. Such a cow- 

 calf is called, in this country, a FREE MARTIN, and is 

 commonly as well known among the farmers as either 

 cow or bull. It has all the external marks of a cow- 

 calf, namely, the teats, and the external female parts, 

 called by farmers the bearing. It does not show the 

 least inclination for the bull, nor does the bull ever 

 take the least notice of it. In form it very much 

 resembles the Ox, or spayed heifer, being considerably 

 larger than either the bull or the cow, having the horns 

 very similar to the horns of an Ox. The bellow of the 

 Free Martin is similar to that of an Ox, having more 

 resemblance to that of the cow than that of the bull." 



Free Martins are very much disposed to grow fat with 

 good food. The flesh, like that of the Ox or spayed heifer, 

 is generally much finer in the fibre than either the bull or 

 cow ; is even supposed to exceed that of the Ox and heifer 



