MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 391 



ment, " Alton asserts that many of the Ayrshire cows in their best condition, and 

 well fed, will yield at the rate of 1,000 gallons of milk in one year, or over ten 

 quarts of milk per day. Rankin, however, states his opinion that Alton had 

 given the daily average produce too high, and thinks that few herds of twenty 

 cows or over will average more than eight hundred and fifty gallons, or about 

 nine quarts a day ! " Mr. Colt's Ayrshire bull, Gcordie, whose faithful portrait 

 is given in this number, was imported with evidences oi personal merit, and un- 

 der other circumstances to insure him to possess in an eminent degree the char- 

 acteristics of his race. The same gentleman has other imported and pure speci- 

 mens of that and of the Alderney race of cattle. There were also two 

 cows and a bull well selected and sent last autumn, consigned to Mr. George 

 Law of Baltimore, by McHcnry Boyd, Esq., to his relative Mr. McHenry of 

 Hartford County, Maryland. Of the particulars of that importation and the 

 considerations which induced it, so far as it may have been prompted by any 

 particular observations or information in Scotland in favor of the breed, we shall 

 endeavor to possess ourselves. We need not say that all notices of the importa- 

 tion or possession of animals, or grasses, or grains, of particular kinds are in- 

 tended as historical of the facts, and to facilitate the wishes of those who may 

 desire to make farther inquiries with a view to information or purchase. 



Having referred to what is said by Mr. Phinney, one of the Trustees of the 

 Massachusetts Society, and doubtless with the sanction of his associates as to 

 the Ayrshire cattle, we may add his remarks on the other breed, the North 

 Devons, also selected by them for importation. " The North Devon stock has 

 long been celebrated as a breed of cattle beautiful in the highest degree. For 

 the dairy they cannot be considered equal to the Ayrshires, but viewing them as 

 uniting the three qualities of working, fattening, and milking, they may be con- 

 sidered as unrivaled. Some of the English writers give them a high rank as 

 milkers, and Mr. Conyers of Capt Hill, near Epping, a district almost exclu- 

 sively devoted to the purposes of the dairy, preferred the North Devons "on ac- 

 count of their large produce, whether in milk, butter, or by suckling." " The 

 North Devon oxen, says an English writer, are minvaled at the plow. They 

 have a quickness of motion which no other breed can equal, and which very few 

 horses exceed. They have also a docility and goodness of temper, and a stout- 

 ness and honesty at work, to which many teams of horses cannot pretend." 



We would add, that in our judgment the horse (as a precarious and expensive 

 machine) ought to be banished from field labor, except where the land may be 

 too heavy for the mule, and the climate too hot for the ox — two circumstances 

 that combine only over a comparatively small portion of our country. 



But in our eyes the most attractive feature in the proceedings of the Massachu- 

 setts Agricultural Society is the following, as set forth in this first "Abstract" 

 made out by Hon. " John G. Palfrey," Secretary of State, and now elected, we 

 believe and hope, to Congress — and that not from any knowledge or care about 

 his party politics, but because in him we know there will be at least one patriot 

 disposed to think that the true and substantial interests of a country may be at 

 least as well served by guiding the plow-share as by brandishing the sword. 

 Here is the act of the Trustees, to which we allude, and that we would holdup 

 for imitation. By-the-by, among many other things that we have at heart to 

 publish, if we can ever find the space, is a beautiful lecture of the celebrated 

 Doctor Pvush, on the importance of the study of Comparative Anatomy by co'in- 

 try practitioners of medicine. 



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