Qiiarterly Journal of Agriculture. 533 



'* May I hope that some of that bright galaxy, who are anxious to see 

 every cottager in Britain keeping his own cow, and are ready to every good 

 work, may kindly step forward in favour of the lowest grade of our English 

 cotters, and enable those who cannot keep a milch cow to keep at least a 

 milch goat. It is undeniable that engagements of this kind among the poor 

 restrain many from evil habits, whose leisure would lead them thereto ; who, 

 instead of being the poachers of the next generation, or the sauntering tip- 

 plers of the village, may become industrious breeders and owners of the little 

 herds browsing on the common, or feeding on the village green and in its 

 grassy lanes." 



We would strongly recommend this subject to the attention of married 

 gardeners, who might feed a goat with the prunings of trees, clippings of 

 hedges, and other articles that a pig would not eat : but we would not do 

 away with the pig, nor with poultry, for the sake of the goat. The grand, 

 and, we fear, insuperable, difficulty attending introducing goats on farms, is 

 the expense of herding them; they can never be left to themselves among 

 hedges or bushes of any kind, and therefore before a gardener or cottager 

 can attempt to keep one, he must enclose a piece of ground, SO or 40 ft. 

 square, with a wall or pales at least 6 ft. high, and he may build a hut of any 

 rude materials in the centre, on which the animal may climb up, and thus 

 amuse itself and take exercise. A great many goats are kept in Italy and 

 Switzerland for the sake of their milk, but they are carefully tended in herds. 

 At Epinal, in France, a good many are also kept, without being always 

 tended, and the consequence is, the hedges of the numerous little gardens 

 that surround the town are cropped by them to such a degree that they look 

 like low turf mounds. On enquiring, in October last, into the cause of this 

 appearance, the gardener of M. Doublat informed us, that after the vintage, 

 and at certain other times, the goats were left at liberty, and cropped every 

 thing that came in their way. It is clear, therefore, that in most parts of 

 Britain go;its must be kept in such enclosures as we have described. That 

 they would add much to the comforts of a poor family we can easily con- 

 ceive, and we therefore hope that some liberal and enlightened proprietor 

 will second the views of this benevolent writer. In many cases the goat- 

 yard might be so joined to the cottage as that the goat might take exercise 

 on the roof, and this roof might be trellised and covered with a rapid grow- 

 ing creeper between the trellis and the slates or tiles, in such a way as to 

 supply the goat with a good deal of food, without permitting him to eat 

 through the main shoots of the creeper. To effect this it would only be ne- 

 cessary to train each main shoot exactly under a trellis rafter. Dr. Clarke 

 tells us, that in some parts of Sweden sheep are pastured on the tops of the 

 houses; pasturing a goat in that situation would be no difficult matter in 

 this country. 



The Quarterly Journal of Agriculture ; and the Prize Essays and Transac- 

 tions of the Highland Society of Scotland. Edinburgh. In 8vo Numbers, 

 quarterly. 5s. 6d. No. V. 



In the present number is the commencement of a series of essays on the 

 Origin and Natural History of Domestic Animals, which we hope will be 

 continued, and the subject of breeding, not properly understood in Scot- 

 land, scientifically discussed. The harrow is in this number treated of in 

 a similar manner to what the plough was in a former one. (p. 179.) There 

 is a valuable paper on beet-root sugar, the important conclusions of which 

 have been already quoted (p. 525.); and one on planting hedges, on which 

 we shall have a word to say at an early opportunity. On the whole, this 

 journal, already stated (p. 173.) to be worthy of the times in which it is 

 produced, continues to maintain its reputation. 



M M 3 



