118 



MONTHLY JOURNAL OF AGRICULTURE. 



Shore of Maryland, had contended that ou his 

 large estate he had cattle equal to tlie crack stock 

 of England. But when these tliree individuals 

 sent out by the late Mr. CHAMnoK, of Blytlic, 

 Nottinghamshire, England, (and paid for by fiznds 

 liberally placed there by the late Robert Oli- 

 ver, at our instance, merely on the suggestion 

 of the good he might thus do to the Agriculture 

 of the State) came upon the show-ground, Mr. 

 L. was seen to walk round and carefully exam- 

 ine them, and tlieu instantly and ou the spot of- 

 fered $1000 for the Bull and the Heifer, White 

 Rose. As we had no use whatever for them, 

 and were, moreover, bound to see the friend in- 

 demnified who had provided the credit for their 

 importation, we told him they could not be sep- 

 arated, but might all three be had for $1500 — 

 somewhere about cost and charges — with which 

 he at once closed, and bought them forthwith, 

 and afterwards said that he considered himself 

 reimbursed by one cross of the bull on his nu- 

 merous herds on the fourteen farms he owned 

 on the Eastern Shore. Such is the history of 

 this first importation of short-homs into Mary- 

 land — a history that may as well be preserved 

 here as elsewhere in the Farmers' Library, 

 where it ought to have place ; and we might, 

 perhaps, as well add, in candor, that resem- 

 blance between Champion, at two years old, 

 and tlie Bull prefixed to these hasty remarks, 

 may have inclined us to choose him from among 

 a vai-iety of fine engravings (the best of them by 

 Scott) in the London Farmers' Magazine. As 

 we have before said, the Herefords and the 

 Devons, and the perhaps equally symmetrical 

 and fine soft-skinned, but not so large, Ajt- 

 shires, and the ragged-hipped, deer-necked, rich 

 milking Aldemeys, shall all — all have their full 

 and fair chance m good time. In the mean- 

 time we present the foUovs^ing essay : 



ON THE GOOD AND BAD POINTS OF CATTLE, 



AND ON THE FORMATION OF FAT AND 



MUSCLE. 



By Mr. Robert Read, V. S., Crediton. 



The skin or external envelope in the rumin- 

 antia herbivora is an important feature in devel- 

 oping the disposition of cattle to fatten, and is of 

 much import to the farmer and grazier. 



A good skin is kno\\Ti by the familiar name 

 of touch — that is, the animal should possess a 

 mellow skin, with resiliency, moderately thick, 

 yet loose and yielding to the fingers when gent- 

 ly elevated, and resuming its station with an elas- 

 tic spring, as if there was underneath a tissue of 

 wool impregnated v^-ith oil. The resilience of 

 good skin in an animal depends on the organi- 

 zation beneath it, and the presence or absence 

 of cellular or adipose tissue. The existence of 

 this membrane constitutes a good handler — the 

 deficiency the reverse. 



The pilarj- or hairy covering should be thick, 

 not coarse ; glossj- and soft, with an inclination 

 to yellow, and in proportion as this exits as a 

 quality or constituent, so ia the propensity to 



(07 .n 



fat : on the other hand, a thinness of hair and 

 coarseness in fibre denotes an unthrifty animal, 

 more especially if conjoined \vith a dense firm 

 hide or skin, and with short hair. This implies 

 a bad handler, and- is a sure indication of being 

 a slow feeder, with a tardy disposition to in- 

 crease in volume, either of fat or muscle. It is 

 by the feel of the cutaneous tissue that a judg- 

 ment is formed as to the state of maturity now, 

 and that an opinion be formed of the condition 

 and v^'orth hereafter. The beautiful mo.st>j «kin, 

 that seems like soft velvet, its peculiar feeling 

 as if it were stretched over a bed of down, when 

 the fingers are applied, and its easy resilience 

 when traction is made use of, are the best and 

 surest prognostics as to the futm-e wortli of the 

 animal. 



Physiologically speaking, a mellow skin 

 arises from a free circulation of the vascular sys- 

 tem through the meshwork of the cellular or ad- 

 ipose tissue, or those cells that are destined for 

 the reception of fat These tissues are consid- 

 ered by some alike s\-nonjTnous anatomically. 

 They are always in a moist state, from the inter- 

 nal cavity of the cell performing the office of 

 exhalation. Want or supply of interstitial de- 

 posit makes a good or bad skin. 



The adipose and reticular tissues are extreme- 

 ly vascular, more especially that portion in im- 

 mediate connexion lying under it A good and 

 kindly handler has a full development of tliis 

 material well spread over the superficies of the 

 external frame under the skin. The membrane- 

 ous tissue is a bed for the origin of the absorb- 

 ents, and die adipose tissue is tlie depository in 

 which the fat is deposited by the exhaleuts pe- 

 culiar to it. These membranes participate in 

 the character of the hide. They are more dense 

 and inelastic, and less expansive. They do not 

 admit of being so readily dilated by the inter- 

 stitial deposit, and, consequently, are longer in 

 acquiiing a mature state in the progress of 

 making fat. 



A thick and unyielding hide, not succumbing 

 to the internal deposit in the adipose tissue under 

 the skin, is thus continually reacting by pressure 

 on the absorbents, and in this manner makes the 

 animal slow in accumulating fat on the external 

 parts of the fi-ame. The diflerence in the feel 

 between the glossy and coarse-haired animal is 

 dependent ou the secretion from the cutis. In 

 the thick skin it is more in.spissated, and exfoli- 

 ates in branny scales. In the mellow and glossy 

 skin it is more oleaginous, ^^•hich may al«) be 

 accounted for. Its having a greater freedom for 

 tlie assimilation of nitrogen — one of the com- 

 pf)unds of ammonia — a chemical agent that is 

 abundantly given oft' from tlie skin and uniting 

 with die unctuous exudation of the cutis, gives 

 to the skin that peculiar saponaceous feel so 

 necessary as the index of that organ perfonuing 

 its healthy functions, and may be ranked as a 

 sure sjnnbol of early maturity. 



The ears should be of a fair proportion, not 

 over large, thin in texture, and capable of free 

 and quick motion. A good ear denotes good 

 quality ; a coarse ear, thick and large, is gejier- 

 ally associated with much coarseness in the ani- 

 mal. A good ear is nearly always found in com- 

 bination with a prominei.t and beaming eye, 

 with thin palpebrae or eyelids. 



This development of eye is most times in uni- 

 son with a good and clean horn, tending to a 

 very slight red at the radicles or roots. This in- 

 dicates also a kindly disposition to early matu- 

 rity. The happy and beaming eye of the healthy 



