COTTON-SEED MEAL. 89 



because, in the first place, they give us a good quality of but- 

 ter ; and, in the next place, they fat easily, and we have no 

 sharp creatures to turn off every two or three years, when it is 

 necessary to eliminate them from our herds. 



Now as to this question of feeding. It is very difficult to 

 controvert the statements of my friend the doctor, especially 

 when he alludes to his experiments ; but he was not here last 

 evening to hear the remarks of Prof. Chadbourne upon the 

 worthlessness of experiments unless conducted on a large scale 

 and with great accuracy. It is very difficult to arrive at a cor- 

 rect conclusion, when we have the testimony of Dr. Loring on one 

 side, and on the other the testimony of farmers all up and down 

 the Connecticut Yalley, who feed cotton-seed meal all through 

 the winter. "We have got to take these opinions and experi- 

 ment for ourselves, and judge accordingly. I have fed cotton- 

 seed meal to a considerable extent, and in one or two instances 

 I thought my heifers were injured by it, and that may have 

 been the case ; but I have fed it very extensively to Durham 

 bulls, and I have not found that tliey have been injured by it 

 in any way. It may be, as the doctor says, that the delicate 

 glands of the female are easily affected by rich oleaginous food 

 like cotton-seed meal, whereas the system of the male, being 

 more hardy, would not be injuriously affected. Therefore you 

 want to use this feed with extreme caution. 



Now as to this question of feeding. Those of us who are 

 living among the hills of Berkshire find the remarks of the doc- 

 tor diametrically opposed to the conclusions at which we have 

 arrived. The idea of telling us that we cannot feed corn-fodder 

 or corn-meal is like taking the very ground from under our 

 feet. We are almost as much wedded to our corn-fields as we 

 are to our wives, and when you undertake to tell us that we are 

 not to give our animals the food which we consider a necessary 

 part of their daily subsistence, it is pretty difficult to point out 

 wliat we shall take in its place. We have thought that the 

 greatest injury we can do to our mowing lands is to feed them 

 off in the fall. All the best farmers have been trying to indoc- 

 trinate the agricultural community with the idea that we are 

 ruinuig our farms by feeding off all this grassy matter in the 

 fall, and leaving almost the bare ground to be exposed to the 

 cold of winter. We have become satisfied, many of us, by 



12 



