No. 4.] BREEDS AND VAEIETIES. 165 



and conditions. Success lies along this line, and it cannot 

 be well secured on any other. 



The Effect of Food ox Breeds. 



Darwin says that " of all the factors which produce vari- 

 ation in animals, food is the most potent." Food is also the 

 greatest factor in producing improvement ; and, if we are 

 aiming to improve animals, of course we are ever trying to 

 produce variation, for if no variation occurs then there can 

 be no advancement. Starting from these fundamental prin- 

 ciples, we may now begin to treat of the details of the feed- 

 ing and care of the animals, in order to produce variation 

 for the better, or variation which shall result in fitting the 

 animals more perfectly for some specific use or uses. 



In order to illustrate, I take the improvement of dairy 

 cattle. Start with the parents ; if, at or just before the time 

 of conception, the parents are fed and cared for as we usually 

 treat the best of our beef breeds, then we have taken one 

 step towards variation for the worse, because a new quality, 

 beef, is being introduced into the blood of the embryo, and 

 we cannot hope to get as good a dairy calf as we would had 

 the sire and dam at the time of copulation been in a condi- 

 tion in which all dairy cattle should be kept. From the 

 moment the calf is born it should be watched and trained for 

 the dairy as carefully and scientifically as is the little foal 

 that is dropped in the trotting stable. It has been dis- 

 covered that, in order to get the best results, trotting colts 

 should be fed and developed towards the uses to which they 

 are to be put when mature. They are not only fed with a 

 view to the track, but they are also exercised with a view 

 to speed. Should the trotting colt be fed like the draft colt, 

 then we might expect marked variation to appear before 

 maturity, and this marked variation for the worse ; and, if a 

 trotter were desired, this would be a very foolish and very 

 unscientific method of treatino; a trottins: colt, I use the 

 trotting colt as an illustration, because of the scientific treat- 

 ment and breeding which is showing such marked results, 

 since the colt has been properly bred, fed and exercised. 



If the dairyman were to use a tithe of the skill in rearing 

 the dairy calf that the horseman shows in rearing the trot- 



