PROCEEDINGS OF THE FARMERS' CLUB. 223 



less than any three year old sheep I have got : I have been 

 anxious to introduce them as a common stock, and have sold them 

 for $100 a pair. A great many are afraid to buy them, for fear 

 they will get away and go wild again. They see me go into the 

 field, and all the flock come about me, and each one try to get 

 his nose into my pocket; but they say,, "I don't believe I could 

 do that ;" they think there is some Rarey secret about it. When- 

 ever I go into the lot I generally cari^y a little handful of salt, or 

 grain, or something which they like, which makes them come 

 about me. 



I think there is no better meat than that of the elk : ii is richer 

 and more juicy than the meat of the deer. I killed a two year 

 old doe this year which had had no fawn; she was very fat; I 

 took twenty-nine pounds of tallow from her, and she weighed 

 two hnndred and eighty-two pounds dressed, the skin weighing 

 twenty-eight pounds. 



Dr. Trimble said that, several years ago, he was traveling in 

 Illinois, over the prairies, and he i-ecollected seeing at a house 

 where he stopped a full grown elk perfectly domesticated. There 

 were no fences about, and it never attempted to run away. He 

 was struck with the similarity between this doe and the doe of 

 the deer : he could hardly see any difierence, except that the doe 

 of the deer is not as stout or strongly built : he also spoke of the 

 beauty of the deer in one of the Philadelphia parks, and said that 

 they were perfectly tame, so that children played about among 

 them. 



Mr. Stratton said the difference betAveen the deer and elk, as 

 regarded their being kept as a common stock, was that the deer 

 could be tamed, but not domesticated, like the elk. The off- 

 spring of a tamed deer is just as wild as it would be under any 

 circumstances until tamed. The elk, on the contrary, seems to 

 be more of a reasoning animal, and may be made as gentle a stock 

 as any common kind of cattle. 



On motion of Mr. Pardee, it was 



Resolved, That the Club recommend to the commissioners of 

 the Central Park to take into consideration the propriety of intro- 

 ducing the American elk into the park. 



SILK CULTURE. 



The regular subject of the day, " The Culture of Silk," was 

 then taken up. 



