HISTORY OF HEREFORD CATTLE 



319 



for cattlemen. The following is from its col- 

 umns (1880) : 



"Butchers regulate, to a greater extent than 

 most people imagine, the amount of meat con- 

 sumed in the city markets. Let the supplies 

 of stock be light or liberal, they are in some 

 way disposed of, without customers seeming to 

 be stinted or overstocked. Given the same 

 number of families to supply, the retailer will 

 work off one-half more meat on them at one 

 time than another. The facts of the matter 

 are about thus: The butcher goes to market 

 and finds cattle scarce and high, and is satisfied 

 that he cannot come out even on his purchases. 

 But his trade must be supplied, and he calcu- 

 lates his needs, selects a few steers, and pre- 

 pares to make a very little beef go a long ways; 

 his customer calls for two or three pounds of 



number in a week of glutted markets. The 

 heathen Chinee is not alone in his peculiarity 

 'for ways that are dark, and for tricks that are 

 vain.' ' ; 



JUDGE JONES, THE DOUBTER (f 207A). 



We took the following from the "Kansas 

 Farmer" (1881), written by the Shorthorn 

 breeder and advocate, Judge T. C. Jones, of 

 Ohio: "Speaking of the demands for Here- 

 fords in this country, Judge T. C. Jones, writ- 

 ing to the 'London Live Stock Journal/ says 

 that 'it is to be observed, in the first place, that 

 it is of recent origin, that it cannot be predicted 

 what the future of the business will be, or 

 whether the Herefords will be so well adapted 

 to the hardships and privations of our wild 

 ranges as now anticipated. The Hereford 



BARNS AND FARMING LANDS. 

 Weavergrace Farm of T. F. B. Sotham, Chillicothe, Mo. 



meat, and the piece is intentionally cut a half 

 pound lighter than ordered, and the buyer 

 'makes it do.' Again he goes to market and 

 finds it overstocked. Cattle are plenty and 

 cheap, and he sees a good thing, buys heavily, 

 and goes to work to dispose of the product. A 

 piece weighing two or three pounds is again 

 wanted at the block, and by cutting a little 

 thicker three or four pounds are handed over 

 to the buyer, who again 'makes it do/ Three 

 out of four customers will say nothing about 

 the extra pound or two, and a skillful salesman 

 will thus work off hundreds of pounds extra in 

 a single day. The same tricks are employed in 

 small stock. We have known a single butcher 

 in this city,who usually kills sixty to seventy- 

 five sheep in a week, to use nearly double that 



breed, like other improved wild breeds of Brit- 

 ish cattle, has been much improved of late 

 years, and will not endure the hardships it was 

 compelled to undergo in some quarters fifty or 

 a hundred years ago; and it is not likely that 

 it will prove more profitable than crosses of 

 the Shorthorn breed, under a system which al- 

 lows a large percentage of the unimproved 

 cattle of the plains to perish from hunger and 

 the severity of the cold every winter. It is, 

 moreover, believed by a majority of intelligent 

 observers, that the range method of producing 

 beef barbarous alike in its influence upon 

 man and beast will prove an ephemeral busi- 

 ness. The grass in these wild and unenclosed 

 districts is scanty and really nutritious but a 

 few months in the year, so that vast ranges 



