90 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. [Pub. Doc. 



JUDGING ANIMALS BY SCALE OF POINTS. 



BY DR. G. M. TWITCHELL, AUGUSTA, ME. 



In the study of any economic problem bearing upon indi- 

 viduals and the State, or between individual and individual, 

 the first thing to do is to come to a full understanding of all 

 existing conditions and surrounding influences. 



The danger of men working by themselves, in shop, mill, 

 study, or on the farm, is that surely, if unconsciously, they 

 become encased in the crust of habit, the hardest crust to 

 break, the one most diflicult to dissolve, and from which 

 there is no relief save friction by contact. 



Under this crust old methods and practices appear to be 

 the only ones to pursue. With eyes blinded with this de- 

 posit, there can be no other path to prosperity save the nar- 

 row one traveled, no implement better than the one used, 

 no class of stock, or individual thereof, more productive or 

 valuable than those on the farm ; and, worse than all else, 

 no theory so good as the rut followed. The thought gets 

 imbedded that books and newspapers are a curse rather than 

 a help, the writers impractical men, improvement an impos- 

 sibility, and every one who has broken away from old prac- 

 tices, a crank with one idea, who is surely on the highway 

 to ruin. 



Probably within five miles of where we now are there are 

 farmers who cannot aflbrd to take a day or half a day to 

 attend these meetings. Their excuse is, " It don't pay." It 

 pays me to go a hundred miles to attend a farmers' institute. 

 God pity the wilfully ignorant ! 



All about us, in town, village and country, these individ- 

 uals are to be found, barnacles on the wheels of progress, 

 yet certain that they and their methods are to save the world, 

 if it is ever saved, the " r/"" in their minds being a surpris- 



