170 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



cuse me for saying it — from feeding green corn ; not at all. It 

 did not make any milk. It made the butter yellow ; but I did 

 not want yellow butter ; I was making milk. It did not seem 

 to be any help in putting on fat. Then I thought it was a 

 grand root for horses. I began to feed it to my horses, as 

 everybody said it was a good thing ; but I found I had got to 

 stop it. The hair did not look right, and yet there was the 

 natural gloss upon it. Their legs began to look rough. It was 

 manifest this root was affecting their kidneys badly. The dis- 

 charge of urine was excessive. Then I noticed that when I un- 

 dertook to drive a carrot-fed horse, I might just as well have 

 undertaken to drive a wash-tub, and a leaky one at that. There 

 was no satisfaction in it. A couple of miles would produce a 

 mass of foam in front of him that was not half as pleasant as a 

 good lathering in a barber's shop ; and I made up my mind 

 that carrots, with the exception of certain medicinal qualities 

 that they might have to restore a horse that had been worn out 

 with grain, were worth nothing. 



Then I read in some agricultural book that the farmers in 

 Ireland, when they began to plough in the spring, fed their 

 horses with turnips ; and I thought, " If an Irish horse will eat 

 turnips, a Yankee horse will ; " and I began to feed my horses 

 with turnips. When I get home, I always like to take a good 

 long drive ; and if it is too stormy for that, I like to go into a 

 stable and look a good honest horse in the face. Four years 

 ago I began to feed my horses on turnips, taking the hint from 

 the book of which I have spoken, and I found no great difficulty. 

 I did have one mare, that was brought up in Vermont, and had 

 not gone through the process of civilization on a Massachusetts 

 farm, that objected to] them ; but the rest of my horses took 

 hold of them readily. I soon found that my horses that were 

 out of condition began to look bright ; instead of their legs 

 being storked, they would be clean and fine ; their eyes grew 

 brighter ; their appetites returned. I believe there are some 

 gentlemen in this room who have put their hands on some of 

 these turnip-fed horses, and I would like to have them say 

 whether they are in good condition or not. I know some of 

 them have been kind enough to say that they drive well. 



That has been my experience in regard to feeding turnips to 

 horses. There is nothing that will make bone so rapidly, or 



