216 WORCESTER SOCIETY. 



lated in reference to the value of carrots as food for milch 

 cows, and prove also the high place this crop should hold in 

 the mind of every good farmer, as food for his swine and stock 

 generally. 



Letter from Hon. John W. Lincoln. 



cows AND CARROTS. 



Gentlemen, — I experienced no little surprise and regret oc- 

 casioned by the perusal of a communication addressed to you, 

 written by J. G. Hoyt, under the above head, and published in 

 the February number of the New England Farmer, in which 

 he states the opinion of a large milk farmer of Bradford, " that 

 carrots do not contribute in the slightest degree to increase the 

 amount of milk in a cow." That his informant maintains, 

 " that while the quality of milk may be improved by carrots, 

 the quantity is not perceptibly affected." He thinks " that 

 carrots, when fed out in ordinary doses, do not diminish in the 

 least the quantity of hay necessary for his cows ; but that they 

 serve merely as condiments." That " he is decidedly of the 

 opinion, that $3 is quite as much as a man can afford to pay 

 for carrots to tickle the palate of a pet cow." You may judge, 

 sirs, how much I differ in opinion from the Bradford farmer, 

 when I inform you, that for several years past, in addition to 

 the quantity I have raised on my own land, I have purchased 

 the surplus carrots of my neighbors, amounting to several tons 

 each year, and paid for them $9 per ton, delivered at my barn, 

 and did then, and now do believe, that I paid no more than 

 their value, not to tickle the palate of a pet cow, but to feed 

 out to my stock. I was disposed to inquii-e whether it was 

 possible I should be so greatly mistaken in my estimate of the 

 intrinsic value of carrots. I was aware that in the table of 

 Rham, of the relative value of different vegetable substances as 

 compared with good hay, carrots were not placed so high as 

 by me ; so also in the table of Boussingault, which has the 

 approbation of Professor Johnston, in his Agricultural Chemis- 

 try, but this was in the production of muscle. I knew that 

 the books were full of commendations of the culture of carrots 

 for stock generally, but particularly for horses, without one 

 word of discouragement, so far as I have knowledge. I had 



