The Fami Livestock of the Period. 263 



as the purple fescue and sheep's fescue, vernal soft grass, 

 bulbous foxtails, great and creeping meadow grasses, etc. 



The experiments of Anderson on timothy-grass, crested 

 dogs' tail, fine bent-grass, milk- vetch, etc., were either too 

 unsuccessful or too incomplete to allow him to decide in their 

 favour. Others, like the bush-vetch of the pea tribe, rib-grass 

 and common yarrow, were adapted for some soils, but not 

 for all. 



From all that has been now said, it will be observed that 

 scientific writers of the day, of whom there were several 

 besides our Scottish author, were carefully studying the 

 botany of the farm, and treasuring up observations which 

 would ultimately prove of the greatest possible value when 

 the analysts of the future should turn their attention to the 

 subject of cattle feeding. ^ 



The various herds of domestic animals were also employing 

 the attention of practical men. And it was high time that 

 they should, for at the beginning of the century the average 

 live-weight of an ox was only 900 lbs., and of a cow 500 lbs. ;^ 

 and the kind of cattle that was most esteemed before Bake- 

 well's day was the large gummy, flat-sided, often " lyery " 

 or black-fleshed variety.^ 



Ot the different sorts, the short-horned or Dutch breed of 

 cows had long held the lead. They not only yielded the most 

 milk, but claimed precedence of any other breed in weight of 

 meat. George Culley tells us of an ox belonging to Sir John 

 Haggerstone, which weighed 140 stone ; and Hill, of Blackwell, 

 had one in 1759 which was then the heaviest known, and 

 weighed 151 stone 10 lb.* This variety came to cede its 

 prominent position to that of Yorkshire, which in its turn 



^ For example, the writings of Linnaeus and Stillingfleet, Grew's 

 Anato7ny of Plants, Fordyce's Elements of Agriculture and Vegetation^ 

 and sundry treatises by Tillet, Duhame], and Haifenfratz on the Con- 

 tinent, and of Priestley, Kirwan, Dundonald, Darwin, Dickson, etc., at 

 home. 



^ The Country Gentleman's Vade Mecum. Giles Jacob, 1717. 



3 Annals of Agricultxire, vol. vi. p. 419. 



* Id. Ibid., p. 423. 



