No. 5. 



Wear of Carriage Wheels — Hoof-ail. 



161 



The court made it a custom, and the people 

 the fashion ever since. 



The above is furnished for the Farmers' 

 Cal)inet, in consetiiience of an encjuirj' being 

 made of the writer durintr the past aulunin, 

 by a fanner, for a reason of the (jreat desire 

 of a number of (dd fashioned people who had 

 emigrated from Knghind to procure geese 

 against the 2'.Hh of (September. Tiie above 

 is the true solution of the question ; and 

 hereafter those who have good geese to 

 sell, will always be likely to obtain a fair 

 price for them, by sending them to market a 

 lew days before this anniversary. O. 



Wear of Carriage Wheels. 



It has been calculated by an engineer of 

 eminence, that every four-horse coach de- 

 posits 12 lbs. of iron in every 100 miles of 

 its journey, and that consequently, assum- 

 ing the number of such coaches passing dai- 

 ly between London and Birmingham alone 

 to be 20, the weight of iron deposited during 

 every transit exceeds 240 lbs. These results, 

 it is stated, are not conjectural, but derived 

 from investigations applied to the horse-shoe 

 and the lire of the wheel — in the first in- 

 stance, previously to use ; and in the second, 

 after the wear and tear of the road had ren- 

 dered them useless ; and they have been 

 found, it is added, as to every ton weight of 

 iron so tried, nearly uniform. 



Hoof-ail. 



To ihe Editor of ihc Farmers' Cabinet. 



Sir, — I have just seen a number of the 

 " Farmer and Gardener" of Baltimore, 

 dated 19th June last, which contains an arti- 

 cle on the " Hoof-ail" of cattle, and copied 

 from the Genesee Farmer, upon widch I 

 will make a few remarks. 



The writer of the article, John B. Bow- 

 ers, dates from Ledyard, and ascribes the 

 loss of the hoofs in three cows, to their 

 having been fed for eight or nine days on 

 spear grass, (I suppose our green grass, 

 foaviridis,")* affected with ergot. The con- 

 jecture is well founded, as you may be 

 tissured by referring to the 5th vol. of the 

 Memoirs of the " Philadelphia Society for 

 Froinoti7iLr Jl^ricullure,''^ p. 11)6, where you 

 Avill see a paper of mine on the subject, 

 Avhich I think will leave no room to doubt 

 as to the cause of the disease. It is a cu- 

 rious fact that the ergot of rye, if groimd 

 into meal with sound rye, when made into 

 bread and eaten, produces mortification in 



* Sei) Doinestic EncycIopoeJia, article, Grass. 



the lower extremities in France. See Me- 

 moirs of the same Society, vol. 3d, Appendix, 

 p. 5. .Tamks Mkase. 



Clicstiuil-slrppt, 

 OctolTT G, 18^. 



On the Hoof Disease, from eatim; hay afj'ccted with 

 Ergot. By James AIea.se, M. D. 



In the year 1803, the late Joseph Cooper, of New 

 Jersey, inlorinctl me, tlml he ha<l oljserved the hay made 

 of ihf natural grP(>i\ grass, or epear-grasa, {poa viridis) 

 growing on his fine ineaiiows, on Potty's Island, made 

 liy bankini: out llie Delaware, to be occasionally alfected 

 with a bl.iclk spear, alwul one-fourth or lialf an inch in 

 leni^th, somewhat resembling the ergot in rye, and that 

 i::uile e ilini such hay became affected wilh a disease ia 

 their hoofs, causinf; them sometimes to drop otT. Ha 

 asiribed llie morhi<l production in the firass, to neglect 

 in supplying it with water from the river, by means ol 

 sluices, duriiii; a dry season. U|>on my meiiiioning the 

 facts siion after, to the late William Rush of Philadel- 

 phia, an extensive grazier, he confirmed them from his 

 own observations at Blooming Grove, near Gray's Court, 

 in the state of New York, inthe winter succeeding the 

 very dry summer of the year 17'd'i- The hay was the 

 proiluce of a bog meadow, it is presumed, therefore, that 

 It was made from the same natural grass thai grew in 

 the meadows of Joseph Cooper. 



Some years after, Mr. W. T. Woodman, of Tre- 

 dyflfrin township, Chester county, Pennsylvania, com- 

 municated to me an account, in liie following letter, of a 

 similar disease, and from alike cause, among his father's 



cattle. 



Sir, — Having observed the remark in the Port Folio 

 for May, 1815, in the review of the third volume of the 

 INIemoirs of the Philadelphia Agricultural .Society, that 

 •'as yet, in America, we have never heard of any hu- 

 man person falling a victim to the ergot, nor indeed is it 

 satisfactorily ascertained that it has ever been injurious 

 to our animals," I think proper to communicate to you 

 an account nf a ilisrase, which, in 1S02 or lB)'i, prevailed 

 in this nei^'liliorhood, amongst milk cows jiarlicularly ; 

 but which also atlVcted other cattle and horses. You 

 will perceive that it was analagous to the one supposed 

 to be occasioned by ergot. 



For my part I am entirely ignorant of the cause, but 

 still I am unwilling to ascribe it to ergot, (with which 

 rye in this neighborhood is more or less affected every 

 year,) for this reason, that milk-cows, which are never 

 fed with rye by our farmers or butter-makers, exhibited 

 more violent symptoms than oxen or horses. 



The farmers attributed the disease to a peculiar mil- 

 dew, which sometimes affects the grass on the bottom 

 meadows of a small struam, the basin of which is very 

 extensive, and very luxuriant, and entirely appropriated 

 to meadow land and suffered to lie under natural grass. 

 No timothy or oiher grass seeds have ever been sown on 

 it, to my knowledge. 



The cattle alTecled did not appear to lose their appe- 

 tite, and while they ate heartily of hay or other food, 

 became daily more and more lean, manifesting great un- 

 easine.'S, occasioned most probably by violent itching. 

 Their hair in many places fell off, or was rubbed off by 

 the animal, in strivinz to scratch itself. After these 

 symptoms had continued for some time, one or both hind 

 ft'et I'Pcaine sore, and the hoofs loose, at which period 

 snme of the animals be?an to grow better. Others lost 

 their hoofs and iiart of their leg^. Three of my father's 

 cows lost both of their hind feet, and some others in the 

 neighborhood were equally as bad. The less began by 

 Iryinc and crowing much smaller from the hoof to half- 

 way between the fetlock and hock ; at which point it 

 appeared as if a string of twine were tied very tight 

 round the leg. Above this part the flesh was to all ap- 

 pearance in perfect health; the lower part was hard, 

 black, and offensive. When the lower part became 

 quite dry, and little else than bone, it separated and fell 

 off, after which the animals lived and ate heartily, hob- 

 bling along on the remaining slumps. They even be- 

 gan to grow fat. Their health seemeii perfect. They 

 would no doubt have lived long in this slate, and were 

 killed only from motives of coinpas.sion. 



One cow belonging to my father, which had lost only 

 one of her hind fe-t, and that at the first joint above tho 

 foot, bore a very strong vigorous calf, which lived and 

 did well. The cow also artorded as much milk after, as 

 before her misfortune, and was pastured on the samo 



