THE UNITED KINGDOM. 201 



prices vary more from fancy than intrinsic value, ranging from 20 to 

 30 for good animals, but three times that amount has been paid for 

 them when sold at auction, and over 100 frequently for very choice 

 specimens. They will no doubt answer all reasonable requirements if 

 exported to genial soils and climates. 



They are regular breeders and will continue to be so to a good old 

 age, but as a natural consequence will fail to retain the quantity and 

 quality of milk as if young and in fall vigor. 



Annual average of milk, 4,880 pounds ; 17 to 20 pounds of milk to 1 

 pound of butter ; quantity of milk to cheese, not known ; average live 

 weight at four years old, 896 pounds. 



RESUME ANALYTICAL COMPARISONS.*' 



Meat producers. As to the profitable size of an animal, there is a 

 great difference of opinion amongst men whose judgment and experience 

 entitle them to great respect. Every man has his favorite breed and 

 this in their eyes is the only breed worthy of cultivation. But we must 

 bear the great fact in mind that the profit of breeder and feeder de- 

 pends not so much upon what the animals make as what it costs mak- 

 ing. The Hereford not infrequently pays the grazier better than the 

 Shorthorn, but the value of a breed is not to be determined by the profit 

 it yields between buying and selling, but by that which it yields to the 

 breeder and feeder conjointly from its birth to maturity. The great 

 objections raised against the Devons is said to be their diminutive size. 

 Now, there are many specimens of the Devon breed that have scaled 

 great weights. Mr. Hancock, of Hales, had a bullock in 1873 whose live 

 weight was nearly 2,788 pounds, and which yielded 1,780 pounds of 

 beef. This animal was five years old arid had been worked on the farm. 

 A well-known breeder, Mr. Hatway, had an animal of the Devon breed 

 which weighed 1,700 pounds deadweight. There are many other indi- 

 vidual animals which have reached extraordinary weight. Mr. Samuel 

 Kinder's champion ox weighed alive 2,128 pounds, and gave a carcass 

 of beef weighing 1,500 pounds, At the Smithfield Club show, in 1875, 

 Mr. Richard Warner's cow weighed alive 2,030 pounds. These weights 

 leave great hopes of further development in size of the general breed. 

 Although these are extreme cases, of which many more can be referred 

 to, they md-y suffice to hold out great encouragement to a beginner 

 to make selections possessing qualities and capabilities calculated to 

 remove the North Devons from the stigma of pigmy animals. Their 

 dairy properties may not rank with the first, but they possess that tend- 

 ency to dairy productions that give every encouragement for great im- 

 provement in that important branch by judicious selections and careful 

 treatment. 



The very best beef-producing animal in existence is the cross between 

 the Scotch Follies and the pure bred Shorthorn bull. This system of 

 crossing is extensively practiced in Scotland. Ninety per cent, of 

 the Aberdeenshire beef, so highly prized in the London market, is a 

 cross between these two breeds. At the Smithfield Club show in Lon- 

 don in 1880 the average increase in weight of six steers of Polled 

 breed under three years of age was 1.78 pounds, and the corresponding 

 class of Shorthorns show 1 .79'pounds. The black Follies will frequently 

 realize at three years in the London Christmas fat-market from 25 to 

 40, and some choice specimens higher sums If the breed were dis- 

 tinguished for milking in the same degree, it would be one of the most 



