FOWLS, TABLE AND MAEKET. 173 



Natural laws are of universal application, and the same 

 laws of breeding which guide us in raising pigs, sheep and 

 cattle, animals raised for their flesh, apply equally to raising 

 fowls for their flesh. What breeder raises full bloods for 

 slaughter? They may be only fit for the shambles, but no 

 one raises them for that end. The grade or cross-bred steer 

 is, for beef, fully ecjual and often superior to the full-blood. 

 Grade mutton-sheep of the long- wool breeds are hardly to be 

 distinguished from full-bloods even by an expert. If we 

 cross such sheep with Southdown rams, we secure in the 

 progeny the size, quick-growing, easy-fattening characteris- 

 tics of the long-wools with the superb form and juicy, 

 marbled flesh of the Downs. So too with pigs ; to gain the 

 highest profit, easiest and most rapid fattening, quickest 

 growth, and in short a combination of all porcine excellen- 

 ces, we do not seek them in one breed but cross two breeds : 

 the one, that of the female, distinguished for size, constitutioa 

 and abundant milk ; the other close, compact, small-boned, 

 with little offal, and this the male. 



In all cases, under all circumstances, everywhere, every 

 time, without exception, with all breeds of every sort of 

 domestic animals, quadrupeds or poultry, full-blooded males 

 should take precedence, and if selected with care for those 

 qualities we most desire we shall be sure to find the charac- 

 teristics reproduced in the offspring of the first, and con- 

 firmed and increased in subsequent generations. Did any one 

 ever hear of a successful raiser of spring market lambs, who 

 used his old merino or common fine-wool ram? I think not. 

 Some use long-wools, some Downs, all use full-bloods, and 

 the result is sure as the spring showers and sunshine. 



A certain breeder of my acquaintance is famous for his 

 fine sucking pigs which he sells for porkers, and I suppose 

 he sells a thousand of them annually, perhaps double that 

 number. They are pure white, grow like weeds, weigh two 

 to three hundred i)ounds by killing time, and his customers 

 think nol)ody else can raise pigs like them — such quick 

 growers, easy keepers, with little heads and offal, making 

 delicate and excellent pork, abundant leaf-lard, and mon- 

 strous hams and shoulders interlarded with fat. What is the 

 secret? Simply this : He has united two dissimilar breeds 



