14 Notes on England and France. 



France, through which I traversed, oxen were never used ; 

 at least I never saw but one working ox, and that ox .in 

 harness, toiling with horses. About the cities of London 

 and Paris donkics are much used ; a hardy, patient, and 

 eminently useful race, inasmuch as they are long lived, and 

 will subsist on very ordinary fare. The heavy dray-horses 

 of London, which are employed almost exclusively in the 

 transportation of porter, are of Flemish origin and of pro- 

 digious size. It is stated that the best-trained farm and 

 cart-horses of the English, are never allowed to mn, but 

 are taught only to walk at the quick step. These horses 

 are generally large and fine, and infinitely more useful than 

 the English race-horse. Whether the team consists of two 

 or more horses, the plowman manages both his plow and 

 his well-trained horses alone ; two horses working abreast, 

 no other driver being ever required. 



The horses of Normandy, or those which carry the dili- 

 gence between Havre and Paris, are stout and strong, and 

 compactly built, and evidently of that same hardy lareed 

 which we here call French^ or Canadian horses., and which, 

 without doubt, were originally brought from this same coun- 

 try into Canada, by the original emigrants from Normandy. 

 Tiiese horses are large ; owing to a colder climate, those of 

 Canada being evidently of diminished size. 



The lands in the vicinity of Paris, and, as I believe, 

 throughout most of that country, are seldom enclosed. In 

 that country, and in the suburbs of that city, flocks of 

 sheep are occasionally seen feeding in the open fields, 

 guarded and attended only by the shepherd-dog, who 

 marches around the flock in a circle continually, and the 

 sheep that attempts to stray is quickly arrested and brought 

 back to the fold. 



At the great rail-road depots, or stations in England, the 

 car-houses are never built of wood, but of iron incombusti- 

 ble, with roofs of sheet-iron, or of slate ; walls of stone or 

 brick. Pillars of hollow cast-iron support the superstruc- 

 ture, the plates, purlines and rafters, being of the precise 

 form of the edge rail, which is used on our rail-roads ; 

 round rods of iron serve as ties, or stays ; similar rods also 

 serve as cross-beams to connect the plates on which the 

 rafters rest. These connecting rods are elevated in the 

 centre, to allow greater head-room and space above, — the 

 slates being secured, resting on narrow strips of iron, which 

 arc laid horizontally at intervals across the rafters. 



