USE OP OXEN. 147 



In the fourth place, it is alleged that he is slower in his move- 

 ments. This is true, hut in a less degree than is often taken for 

 granted. Oxen that are well chosen for their form are not worked 

 after the age of about eight years, (the age at which they are best 

 fitted for beef), are not worked too many together, and are suitably 

 matched, may be kept at nearly as quick a step as that of the horse, 

 might I not say quicker than that of many of the horses we see at 

 •work, who, on account of their age, or the leanness occasioned by 

 the costliness of the food they require, lose the advantage where they 

 might have once had it ? 



The last objection has most weight. The ox is not as well adapted 

 as the horse to the road service, especially for long trips. In common 

 roads, which are often soft, and sometimes suddenly become so, the 

 form of his foot and the shortness of his leg are disadvantages ; and, 

 on roads frozen or turnpiked, the roughness of the surface in the 

 former case, and its hardness in both cases, are inconvenient to his 

 cloven foot. But where the distance to market is not great, where 

 the varying state of the roads and of the weather can be consulted, 

 and where the road service is less in proportion to the farm service, 

 the objection is almost deprived of its weight. 



In cases where it most applies, its weight is diminished by the 

 consideration that a much greater proportion of service on the farm 

 may be done by oxen than is now commonly done; and that the ex- 

 pense of shoeing them is little different from that of keeping horses 

 shod. It is observable that when oxen are worked on the farm over 

 rough frozen ground, they suffer so much from the want of shoes, 

 however well fed they may be, that it is a proper subject for calcula- 

 tion whether true ecpnomy does not require for them that accommo- 

 dation, even on the farm, as well as for the horses. 



A more important calculation is, whether, in many situations, the 

 general saving by substituting the ox for the horse would not balance 

 the expense of hiring a conveyance of the produce to market. In the 

 same scale with the hire is to be put the value of the grass and hay- 

 consumed by the oxen ; and in the other scale, the value of the corn, 

 amounting to one-half of the crop, and of the grass and hay consumed 

 by the horses. Where the market is not distant, the value of the 

 corn saved would certainly pay for the carriage of the market portion 

 of the crop, and balance, moreover, any difference between the value 

 of the grass and hay consumed by oxen, and the value of the oxen 

 when slaughtered for beef. In all these calculations, it is doubtless 

 proper not to lose sight of the rule, that farmers ought to avoid pay- 

 ing others for doing what they can do for themselves. But the rule 

 has its exceptions, and the error, if it be committed, will not lie in 

 departing from the rule, but in not selecting aright the cases which 

 call for the departure. It may be remarked that the rule ought to be 

 more or less general, as there may or may not be at hand a market 

 by which every produce of labour is convertible into money. In the 



