No. 149.] 241 



periods, auimals valuable for milk and fattening; indeed, 

 tjie oxen here described attest it possessed the latter. We think 

 we may challenge the world to compare or equal us in working 

 oxen. No cattle can work, fatten, or give large quantities of milk, 

 without plenty of feed, and this good, and taken quietly and at 

 their ease ; in this, too, (feed,) we abound, if only properly man- 

 aged and judiciously distributed. The English, as we have ob- 

 served, surpass us in the care bestowed upon their animals, es- 

 pecially cattle for fattening, and owing to this, perhaps, they 

 have a greater number of superior ones than we have. We can 

 cite many cases of as large and as fat animals as ever they pro- 

 duced, and if they are not of the pure native breed, they are 

 mixed and produced by crosses of the best improved foreign, and 

 some of our best native breeds. When we say foreign, we do not 

 mean they had their origin abroad, but they descended from 

 those that had, and some instances may be given of as good from 

 the pure native breeds. We will name two or three samples, 

 and numbers might be cited. The ox Leopard, ot Bridgetown, 

 N. J., in 1812, weighed 3,360 lbs.; a pair of cattle bred at Wood- 

 bury, weight of the two 6,082 lbs. in 1837; a calf, purely native, 

 bred and fattened on the banks of the Hudsoif in our State, and 

 took the premium at a county fair, and sold when two years old 

 in 1844, weighed 2,000 lbs. At the fair of the American Insti- 

 tute, in 1850, a pair of oxen, bred and fattened on the banks of 

 the Hudson, and took the highest premium, weight 6,580 lbs., 

 and purely native. The mammoth ox, Bed Jacket, also exhibit- 

 ed at the same fair, weight 4,500 lbs., and believed to be the 

 largest one on record. The most profitable cross for our farmers, if 

 they do deal in foreign breeds, as experience has fully shown, is 

 to cross with the best of these after the first generation, on the 

 best natives; the former then get inured to our climate, feedand 

 manners of treatment. Habit has much to do with everything 

 that has life, plants as well as animals. Our friends of the west, 

 especially Kentucky and Ohio, have cultivated largely the Dur- 

 ham breed ; these make fine, handsome cattle, and fatten easily 

 on their ricli pastures. They are delicate though, less hardy, 

 and cannot stand the fatigue of travel to the eastern markets like 



the natives. The former lose more flesh, and get diseased, have 

 [Assembly, No. 149.] Q 



