120 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



grains of strychnine placed in a beef's head judiciously 

 located as a preventive against loss (by foxes) , are our only 

 guards. To show how unavailing any attempt at legislation 

 must be, it is enough to give some figures. 



The census shows 15,2L8 dogs, valued by their 13,071 

 owners at $10.35 each. So much for dog owners and census 

 returns when they make such returns as suit themselves. 

 The county treasurer's books show the tax paid on dogs to 

 be, for 181)0, $169,057. The tax is $2.00 per head for males, 

 and $5.00 for females. The number of dogs has not been 

 returned to the comptroller, but, as he says, the number of 

 female dogs being small, you can allow $3,000 for them; 

 dividing the rest of the tax by two gives you 88,000 dogs 

 and about as many dog owners, as against 45,899 sheep and 

 2,500 owners. It's a pitiable sight : 2,500 men contending 

 for the right to enjoy a peaceable, legitimate and profitable 

 industry, against 88,000 holders of generally dangerous, 

 avage and worthless non-producing brutes. 



/Sheep as Food. 

 Mutton and lamb are favorite food of the English and 

 Scotch of all classes; notwithstanding all that has been said 

 or written of the " roast beef of Old England," more mutton 

 is eaten by people of every rank than beef. Mutton for- 

 merly was not a favorite food of the people of the United 

 States, though the proportional consumption is greatly 

 increasing ; the dilFerence may be largely attributed to cir- 

 cumstances which have led to habit, and habit to a large 

 extent regulates the appetite. The circumstances may be 

 partly these : that formerly we had none of the real mutton 

 sheep to eat ; our old native stock was poor, and the Merinos 

 vastly worse. The sheep formerly killed were too often old 

 and poor, and the cheapness of the animals too often brought 

 them as food to those who were compelled to eat them ; farm 

 laborers, apprentices, servants and others learned to thor- 

 oughly dislike mutton ; and many men and women so far 

 advanced as to have perhaps every other recollection of 

 school days wiped from the memory, still retain in the most 

 lively manner the disgust created by the inevitable daily 

 mutton of the boarding-house. The remarkable experiments 



