CHAP. xii. SLICED ROOTS. 211 



i 



use of pulped food for cattle, it is necessary to state that the opinions 

 of many who then held that pulping was an economial method of pre- 

 paring food, and that pulped food was beneficial to animals, have 

 received very considerable modifications ; so considerable indeed that 

 pulping is carried out to a very much less extent than it was. One of 

 the best, at least one of the most striking evidences of this, is to be 

 met with in the implement department of our show yards. Some years 

 since pulping machines were to be seen everywhere, and the sale of them 

 was very large. Although still used, and therefore still sold, the sale 

 has fallen off so considerably that it is a somewhat difficult thing to find 

 specimens on " stands " at which they formerly were a decided feature. 

 When a considerable change takes place in any practice there are good 

 reasons for it, and it is worth while to enquire into its cause. In this 

 case it is specially so, not only from its practical importance, but from 

 the interesting physiological points connected with it. Turnip slicing 

 and turnip pulping come under two different classes of processes, and 

 are designed to serve two different ends ; although, to a certain extent, 

 root slicing embraces both. In the slicing of roots economy is chiefly 

 aimed at, for in eating a whole root, not only has the animal a difficulty 

 in getting hold of it, and this chiefly on account of its spherical form, 

 which gives it a continual tendency to slip out of its mouth, but the 

 process of munching it, so to say, is consequently so. tedious that after 

 a while the animal gets tired of it and leaves it. Now when once food 

 is thus left by cattle it is worthy of remark that they will not return to 

 it ; or if they do, it will only be under the pressure of hunger. The 

 probability is that the continued breathing of the animals upon the root, 

 and its being covered with the saliva which issues so plentifully from 

 their mouths during the process of eating, gives it a peculiar odour or 

 flavour that they have quite a dislike to. Be this as it may, the fact 

 remains that to give cattle whole roots is a very wasteful way. Hence 

 it was seen at a very early stage in the history of modern farming that 

 some method of dividing the roots so as to enable the cattle to get an 

 easy bite at them would result in some saving. At first this was done 

 simply with a knife, or with the part of the old sickle used to top the 

 turnips, or rid them of the shaws or leaves. This was a slow process, 

 so slow that it could not be applied where the cattle were numerous. 

 Hand-wrought lever slicers were next introduced ; these greatly aided 

 the cutting process, but still the full work done by them, even with the 

 niost*active of cattle-men, was far behind the requirements of large, 

 indeed even of comparatively small, establishments. At length the 

 ingenuity of our machinists, urged by the necessities of the case, and 

 by the no less forcible appeal made to their pockets by the certainty 

 that if a good machine was designed, to do the work it would meet with 

 a large sale, resulted in machines, more or less effective, being intro- 

 duced capable of doing work on the large scale ; and these were gradu- 

 ally improved, till we now have them capable of giving the maximum 

 of work with the minimum of labour. 



When the system of slicing roots became a regular part of the work 

 of the cattle-feeder, it was soon noticed that not only was there a great 



p 2 



