ON CUTTING AND PREPAIIING FEED. 69 



said to contain more nutriment, can add but little to the product 

 of milk; it may keep some animals from starving, but it will 

 never improve their flesh ; and it may be received as an axiom, 

 in feeding all animals, that the value of the feed is in propor- 

 tion to the quantity of nutritive matter contained in its con) po- 

 nent parts. Bulk is also necessary to sustain the action of the 

 stomach ; but it serves no other purpose." 



In another place, after referring to Parkinson's account of his 

 horsekeeping, before mentioned, the writer goes on to say, " but 

 to have occasioned this great expense, the straw must have been 

 chopped very fine, which is not merely unnecessary, but even 

 objectionable ; for mastication will be better effected if it be cut 

 rather long ; and that operation is of the first necessity, as re- 

 gards the digestion, and consequently the nutriment of the ani- 

 mal. In the south of Europe, more particularly in Spain, where 

 many fine horses are bred, hay is generally unknown ; and the 

 straw, upon which, with barley, they are wholly kept, is always 

 given only partially cut as rack meat, and never as chaff. In 

 Kent, however, but more especially in the eastern part of that 

 county, the teams are kept entirely upon short-cut straw and un • 

 thrashed oats, given in the manger, the oat sheaves being es- 

 timated to produce above seven bushels of grain weekly for a 

 team of four horses ; or if clear corn be given, the common al- 

 lowance is four bushels of oats and two of beans ; and some 

 farmers, it appears neither allow corn nor hay, but give about 

 two hundred weight of beans, with an unlimited quantity of 

 straw and perhaps a small portion of sanfoin hay cut into 

 chaff." 



My next reference will be to some experiments detailed by 

 Sir John Lindain : for though the mode of feeding adopted in 

 England differs materially from that used in this country, they 

 knowing nothing of our Indian corn, and we as little of their 

 horse bean, yet the experiments are, on every account, valua- 

 ble and instructive. 



" Mr. Willan, who is interested in so many stage coaches to 

 and from London, formerly used to consume every year about 

 10,000 quarters of oats from the port of London, and about 



