510 Teaxsactwxs of the American Institute. 



civilized a nation or a people becomes the better they cook their 

 steaks. Practical farmers know that all sort of stock thrive better on 

 grain or roots that are well done. 



Mr. Solon Robinson. — I am willing to concede the gronnds of the 

 gentlemen that animals tlirive best on cooked food ; but the question, 

 and the important question, is: Will it pay, and if so, when and 

 where ? In the west it did not prove proiitable to cook corn when 

 corn was ten cents a bushel. I remember well that Henry L. 

 Ellsworth, formerly Commissioner of Patents, tested the subject as 

 fully as anybody, and he decided against the practice. As to pota- 

 toes, I grant that hogs will not take them raw, but horned cattle will, 

 and the latter fatten twice as fast as when cooked. I dispute the oft- 

 made statement tliat men degenerate by eating raw meat. They do 

 grow fierce and fond of savage sports, I admit, but it does not injure 

 them physically. On the contrary, they grow strong and athletic. I 

 agree with Dr. Smith that corn in the kernel comes in no question- 

 able shape, but just as nature intended. 



Mr. D. B. Eruen. — Ten or twelve years ago this question was 

 brought up in Kentucky, and some distinguished gentlemen, among 

 them Cassius M. Clay, made a report, the gist of which, if I mistake 

 not, was to the effect that there is from twenty tp forty per cent 

 benefit in cooking food. I know from my own experience that there 

 is fifty per cent gain in fattening fowls. 



Mr. Solon Robinson. — I am familiar witli the report alluded to, and 

 there was another side to the story. Some Kentucky feeders, equally 

 influential, brought the best of evidence that they could not make it 

 pay at the prices which then prevailed. In that belief I rest, where 

 corn is less than one dollar per bushel. 



Gkapes from Green Island. 

 David Tliompson, a hale old gentleman, whose eighty winters freeze 

 ■with one rebuke all who sneer at country life as dull or tasteless, 

 appeared before the Clul) with a splendid show of native grapes. 

 He spread the table with luscious branches, and suspended others 

 from the walls and chandelier. In response to an invitation of the 

 Cliairman, he explained that he offered four kinds ; that they grew on 

 his ])remises in the open air, and many to whom they had been shown 

 supposed them to have been produced under glass. " Here is a clus. 

 ter" said Mr. Thompson, "which has been handled by probably 500 

 persons, and I challenge tlie universe to show such another out of 



