32 THE farmer's guide. 



ercise for the first £e\v days greatly injures him. Judi- 

 cious farmers confine the colt in the stable if the mare is 

 obliged to perform a large day's travel ; but care should 

 be taken, when the mare returns at night with a bag dis- 

 tended with milk, that the colt be kept from her until 

 three fourths of the milk has been extracted by hand, 

 for, by remaining in the bag so long (especially if the 

 weather be warm), it is rendered impure. When colts 

 are five months old, they can safely be weaned, after 

 which they will require fresh tender clover, and rowen. 

 They need warm stabling for the first two years. If the 

 breaking process is commenced carefully at two years 

 old, it renders them the more valuable. 



THE MULE. 



The great value of the mule for agricultural purposes 

 has long been known and generally acknowledged. By 

 those who have given this animal a trial, his decided 

 superiority to the horse is universally conceded. The 

 mule, it is true, does not possess the fineness, symmetry, 

 elegance, or commanding action and appearance of the 

 well-bred horse, but for strength, patient endurance of 

 hard usage, slender pasturage, and privation, he is far 

 better suited to the general uses of the fanner, than the 

 horse possibly can be. 



In the New-England states, where these hybrid animals 

 were first introduced to any great extent, they were the 

 offspring of such worthless progenitors that they never 

 became general favorites. The breeding of mules, how- 

 ever, has been taken up by the western and southern 

 farmers ; and throughout the slave states, especially, 

 where the stock is necessarily exposed to rough treat- 

 ment, they are considered as an invaluable substitute 

 for the horse. For the caravans that pass over the al- 

 most inaccessible ranges which form the continuation of 

 the Rocky mountains, and the extensive and arid plains 

 that lie between and beyond them, on the route to Cali- 

 fornia, mules are the only beasts of burden used in these 

 exhausting and perilous adventures. To sum up the 



