88 HOW TO BREED MULES. 



Item better than the horse, — and twice as much of each on€ 

 of them as the horse, provided he be not hurried ; keeping 

 himself in perfect condition, where the horse would knock 

 up and starve ; that he can do all this on half the food 

 and with half the care that the horse requires, although 

 the more food and the more care both have the better they 

 will do their work ; and lastly, the mule being an animal 

 of great longevity and great retention, or conservation, of 

 both his vital energies and his physical powers, is able to 

 work to the advantage of his owners, twice, if not thrice 

 as many years as the average of horses. These are the in- 

 ducements to breed the mule, and to apply it strictly to 

 the purposes for which it is best fitted, and foi which na- 

 ture seems to have intended it. 



We propose now to treat of the difference between the 

 mule of Europe and that now generally raised in the 

 United States ; the error, as we believe it to be, in the 

 present American system of breeding, and the best plan 

 to be adopted for raising the most valuable mules. 



Inasmuch as asses are not bred to any extent in the 

 United States, it is of the first consequence for breeding to 

 import fine jacks from their native countries, of the breed 

 and description most suitable to the purposes for which 

 they are intended ; and of the second, to cross them with 

 properly-selected mares, so as to raise mules of the best 

 type, size and substance for general work. 



A nd it will be well here to observe that in the United 

 States generally the work of the mule is and ever will 

 continue to be, — unless some radical change takes place — 

 which is not to be expected — in the tastes and habits d! 

 the people, — field-work, agricultural labor and team-draugnt 

 on the roads, as opposed to use under the saddle or in 

 pleasure vehicles. In the prairies, plains and mountains 

 of the extreme west, on the Mexican frontier and on the 



