192 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



April 



be trusted. This is as necessary as anything, | 

 and is the first necessity — the necessity on 

 which hang the rest. 



The dirt being away, the air must be pure. 



This you cannot scald ; you must therefore 

 resort to other means — and these means are, not 

 a confined bad air of the cellar or milk-rooms, 

 especially foul with vegetable odors ; nor the 

 aroma of the dunghill; the rank, urinal steam 

 of the stables ; nor in the case of a cheese 

 factory, the proximity to a pig pen ; but an 

 avoidance of all of them — for these things will 

 as certainly t JBfect the milk as the dirt left in 

 the pan. 



An absolute freedom from everything that 

 is offensive in ordor or flavor, is the requisite 

 to prime cheese, or a first quality of butter. 

 Who has not detected the common taint of 

 the stables in milk and cream ? Can this be 

 endured ? 



Butter kept in the room over night with the 

 family (in winter,) is not fit to use. It has 

 absorbed so much of the odors that it has be- 

 come foul. The taste of the bad^ir is plainly 

 perceptible. But cover your butter plate (not 

 an old one) with a tight dish — say a tin basin, 

 and your butter will be found much the same 

 as when placed there. It is, however, only 

 perfect when kept — not occasionally put — in 

 pure air. House-keepers take note. When 

 once tainted it can never be cured, but tena- 

 ciously holds all it has, and gets all it can. 

 Like charcoal, or gypsum, or earth, it is a 

 powerful absorber. From the time it is gath- 

 ered in the cow until it is eaten in the family, 

 the greatest care must be given to the lacteal 

 product. Not only that, it reaches still far- 

 ther; the food, the water, must not possess the 

 odor. But generally the worst is in the ves- 

 sels and the atmosphere that comes in contact 

 with it. These, at least if impure, impart 

 their impurity, however pure the milk may 

 have been before.— Western Farmer. 



aXTKACTS AND KEPLIES. 



TEXEL SHEEP. 



Do you know anything further than what was 

 published sometime since in regard to the Texal 

 sheep ? Perhaps some of your correspondents 

 have tried tliem ; if so, will they please report in 

 your paper. Some coarse wooled bucks of some 

 breed are needed in this section, and if owners of 

 such stock would advertise, stating price, it might 

 prove a benefit all round. h. 



Martha's Vineyard, Mass., Feb., 1870. 



Remarks. — Something over a year ago, R. H. 

 Hughes, of Abington, Va., in a communication to 

 the Farmer's Gazette, Richmond, says, "When I 

 saw the Patent OflSce account of the Texel sheep, I 

 1 thought I recognized the breed which we needed j 

 in South West Virginia, and ordered a pair of I 

 them. It was in 1866. In form they resemble the ] 

 Southdown ; in fleece, the Cotswold ; in hardiness, 

 the Merino. They are a large sheep, and should 

 not run in flocks of more than a hundred. The 



staple is not less than seven inches long; often 

 much longer ; and in the full-bloods is glossy and 

 flowing. The ewes are capital nurses. The oldest 

 mutton I have from them are yearling half-breed 

 wethers. These have never had grain, but I am 

 sure that their flesh will, in flavor and tenderness, 

 compare with any mutton that is to be procured. 

 My full-blood ram is now five years old ; and the 

 full-blood ewes four years. They continue to 

 grow and improve at these ages. At two years old 

 the average weight of the grass-fed mutton would 

 exceed a hundred pounds net ; the half-blood year- 

 lings now weigh from sixty to seventy-five pounds 

 net." Mr. Chauncey B. Thorn, of Skaneateles, N. 

 Y., in a letter to Mr. Chenery, says, "their wool 

 is rather ahead of what I was led to expect. One 

 of my ewes sheared eight and one-half pounds, 

 weight of carcass eighty-six pounds, showing sam- 

 ples eleven inches in length, and its fineness and 

 lustre comparing favorably with the best Cots- 

 wold samples which I have been able to procure 

 at our State Sheep Exhibitions." Who, nearer 

 home, has tried the Texels ? 



MALFORMATION IN A HEIFER S TEAT. 



I have a heifer with an extra orifice half way up 

 one of her teats. What can be done for it ? 

 Braintree, Mass., Jan. 26, 1870. o. h. a. 



Remarks. — The indication to be fulfilled in this 

 case is to obliterate the extra orifice and the pipe 

 which leads from it to the natural duct or pipe. 

 This can be done only by exciting what surgeons 

 call adhesive inflammation by the use of caustic or 

 cautery. A strong solution of nitrate of silver, 

 or of corrosive sublimate may be introduced into 

 the unnatural opening, by means of a tent or a piece 

 of cotton or linen cloth, made so small that when 

 twisted hard it can be introduced the whole length 

 of the abnormal pipe. This tent should be kept in 

 until matter discharges from the opening, with- 

 drawing and wetting it with the solution once or 

 twice a day. 



The quickest way, however, and perhaps the 

 best one, will be to measure the length of the pipe, 

 and then thrust into it a hot needle or wire. In 

 either case, care must be taken that the nataral 

 duct or pipe be not injured. 



OVERFLOWING OF GALL AND LIVER COMPLAINT. 



On reading the statement in relation to a sick 

 cow by your Rhode Island correspondent in the 

 Farmer of Nov. 27, I mistrusted that the disease 

 was misunderstood, and thought that she died of 

 overflowing of the gall and liver complaint. With 

 this impression I wrote to Stephen Leavitt of Liv- 

 ermore. Me., a very skilful veterinarian, asking 

 his opinion of the case and requesting him to give 

 me the symptoms of overflowing of the gall and 

 liver complaint, and also the proper treatment 

 of that disease. His opinion corresponds with 

 mine, and he wrote me as follows : — 



"In the first stages the hair is rough on the sides 

 and appears to have changed color. If you take 

 up a handful of the hide near the back bone the 

 creature will flinch as quick as if you bad stuck 

 a sharp pointed knife into its hide ; its skin is also 

 hard and stiff and sometimes it will crack. In 



