264 



Quantity in June was 44 lbs. 7 oz. In July and August, her 

 milk was not kept separate from that of other cows. Weighed 

 her milk (for one day, H. C.) on the 7th of April ; it weighed 

 43 lbs. 9 oz. On the 2d of September commenced weighing 

 her milk ; in four days it has averaged 25 lbs. 8 oz. and has 

 made in four days just five lbs. of butter. My pasture through 

 the season has been very poor and short, owing to the dry wea- 

 ther and having too much stock for the quantity of pasture.* 

 From the time this cow was turned to grass until this day, (9th 

 Sept.) she has had by measure two quarts of Indian meal per 

 day regularly. 



The Ayrshire bull belonging to the Society has been kept in 

 Berkshire, Hampshire and Worcester counties ; and a fair oppor- 

 tunity will soon be had of testing the qualities of his stock. 

 One of the best farmers in Berkshire county speaks to me of 

 their promising extremely well. In my opinion, the only cer- 

 tain test of the dairy properties of a cow is in the milk-pail and 

 the churn. 



Of the Improved Durham Short Horn race we have undoubt- 

 edly had some of the best animals ever brought into the coun- 

 try, both with high aristocratic pedigree, and without pedigree, 

 of uncertain and plebeian origin. In some parts of the coun- 

 try, large expenditures have been incurred in the importation 

 of this stock ; and Admiral Coffin, of the British Navy, in 

 grateful remembrance of the land of his nativity, presented to 

 the Massachusetts Society several fine animals of undoubted 



* When such farmers as Messrs. Phinney and Randall say, as does the 

 former, " that his pastures afforded but a very short bite of grass, and that 

 these two best cows ran with his other stock and had no other food than 

 what they could get in these dry pastures ;" and the latter, that his pasture, 

 where he kept his Ayrshire cow, was poor and short and overstocked, 1 

 cannot but hope they had a few twinges of conscience for presenting such 

 an evil example to their brother farmers, who are looking to them as fugle- 

 men. This is certainly not the way they treat their other friends ; nor are 

 they at all suspected, from appearances, of sul)jecting themselves to the 

 same penance. The general treatment of the cows in New England would 

 not be an inapt subject of presentment by a grand jury. 



