528 



HISTORY OF HEREFORD CATTLE 



MORE OF MR. CAMPBELL'S EXPERIENCE. 



To the "Gazette": 



In reply to Mr. G. W. Rust's letter which ap- 

 peared in your issue of December 4th, I will 

 say my former letter was written away from 

 home while awaiting the arrival of a train, 

 hence Mr. Rust's previous letter was not before 

 me. I have since referred to it and find every 

 essential point fully answered by well-authenti- 

 cated facts. Had the gentleman but known my 

 views in reference to the proper manner of 

 breeding and rearing bulls for range use, he 

 would have saved himself the trouble of writing 

 a whole column to convince the public of my 

 stupidity in not rushing headlong, at break- 

 neck speed, to catch on to his wise suggestion. 

 I have never deemed it necessary to dispute self- 

 evident facts, which seems to be Mr. Rust's 

 strong forte, from which he discharges his 

 heavy theoretical guns. Now, in order to dis- 

 abuse the gentleman's perverted mind and to 

 set him right on the point in question, I will 

 quote the following from one of my letters that 

 went the rounds of the public press years ago, 

 at which time (according to Mr. Rust's views) 

 I was a competent judge : 



"The weather by this time has become ex- 

 ceedingly hot, and the aristocratic bovine dukes 

 and princes that have so suddenly been deprived 

 of elegant quarters and epicurean diets begin to 

 languish and dwindle away until there is 

 nothing left but an unsightly rack of hair and 

 bones. The result is nothing more than could 

 have been expected under the circumstances. 

 These animals have been bred and fed to sell, 

 without any regard to their future usefulness. 

 Many of them have been in the stalls all their 

 lives, up to the very day of their shipment, and, 

 as a natural result, have accumulated soft, 

 spongy flesh and but little sinew, bone or mus- 

 cle, so essential to all range cattle. Such ex- 

 perience has led many ranchmen to believe that 

 thoroughbreds are not hardy or profitable for 

 the plains, when in fact the fault should have 

 been placed upon the breeder's shoulders. The 

 truth is, no cattle are more hardy than the 

 thoroughbreds, when properly bred and reared, 

 and none so profitable to the ranchman. The 

 stall-fed, pampered bulls that have never felt 

 the summer's heat or winter's cold, never have 

 and never can give satisfaction when taken to 

 the plains. Our ranchmen cannot use too much 

 care in the selection of their bulls. In reality 

 the bulls are half their herds, for upon them 

 depends the number and quality of their in- 

 crease. They should select good, hardy young 

 bulls, showing plenty of masculine vigor and 



constitution, and such only as carry plenty of 

 flesh and show an aptitude to fatten without be- 

 ing tied up in the stalls and stuffed. Bulls of 

 this character that have been raised in open air 

 always have been profitable and given the best 

 of satisfaction to western ranchmen." 



So much for my stupidity and Mr. Rust's 

 recent discovery. He contends that one breed 

 is as hardy as another, which he knows is not 

 true. Would it not be ridiculous to contend 

 that the beautiful little Jerseys were as hardy 

 as the shaggy-coated West Highlanders or Gal- 

 loways? 1 assure you the difference between 

 the Shorthorns and Herefords is as well estab- 

 lished, and this marked distinction has resulted 

 from the different manner in which they were 

 bred and reared. Furthermore, Mr. Rust's own 

 writings justify this conclusion. I am glad he 

 has named Mr. Gillette in this connection, and 

 he might have added the names of William 

 Warfield, the Messrs. Potts, Col. Harris of this 

 state, and a few other intelligent gentlemen who 

 have labored hard and unceasingly to build up 

 and improve the Shorthorns by breeding for in- 

 dividual worth, constitution and the butcher's 

 block, which is the ultimatum of all beef ani- 

 mals. Unfortunately, while these gentlemen 

 were trying to improve the Shorthorn race, 

 thousands of their fellow breeders were as ener- 

 getically breeding down, breeding pedigrees in- 

 and-in, and individual merit, constitution and 

 vitality out, until the entire race was almost 

 engulfed and the country flooded with wheez- 

 ing, coughing, consumptive weeds, unfit for 

 use in any herd. This is very near the lan- 

 guage once applied to Shorthorns by Mr. Rust, 

 and fully explains why Shorthorns have proven 

 so inferior to other breeds when put to the test 

 in the open plains. 



Mr. Rust is very anxious to know how it 

 happened that I lost one of my first Hereford 

 bulls, and why it was that a previous one for a 

 time did no good. He says, "As a candid gen- 

 tleman, Mr. Campbell should have stated such 

 matters as these." Now that I have been placed 

 on the witness stand, I shall give my evidence, 

 from which I trust Mr. Rust will extract solid 

 comfort. The first animal referred to was 

 killed in my absence by an irritable, half-wit- 

 ted wretch by the name of Magee, who lived on 

 an adjoining farm. The bull was a good one 

 and I wished I had more of the same sort. The 

 latter, that he alleges did me no good, was tem- 

 porarily disabled by the formation of a fibrous 

 tumor, which I removed by the use of the knife 

 (I have done the same with a number of Short- 

 horns), after which he proved a vigorous 

 server and an excellent getter. After leaving 



