34 NOTES ON FIELDS AND CATTLE. 



two years old if a carter, four or five years if of 

 nobler race ; as yearlings, half-bred or cart-horses, 

 fetch less than as suckers, inasmuch as they look 

 worse. They have lost the plump beauty of in- 

 fancy, and hobbledehoy points attract but few — no 

 wise man, certainly, unless he know the stock they 

 come of. 



A first-rate colt of power and form is as much a 

 fancy article as an emerald; and let breeders abound 

 to any extent, will always bring its value. 



I have known a pair of three-year old Suffolk 

 carters, colt and filly, go to Australia at two hundred 

 and seventy-five guineas each ; sold, certainly, by a 

 breeder of celebrity, and there is much in a name. 



Your young ones, I repeat, you cannot keep too 

 well. When weaned, which should be, both for 

 their own and their mothers' sake, but especially 

 the mothers', about September, give them plenty of 

 new cow's milk, diluted somewhat with water, 

 crushed corn, and bean-flour, with swedes to make 

 them bone, a few white peas, and a lock of the 

 sweetest upland hay. This, with gentle caresses, 

 should daily be the lot of the young one in his 

 paddock and shed. After all, what is it but so many 

 pounds put out to interest ? 



Starve a colt in his first year, and he is spoilt for 

 ever. No subsequent treatment, however judicious 

 or generous, can redeem the neglect of his early 

 youth — the sinking loin, the worn look, the spindle 

 shanks, too surely attest the treatment he received 

 in infancy, whatever his original calibre may have 

 been. 



