CHAPTER III. 
BREEDING AND SELECTION. 
The Breeder—The business of the stock-breeder is a 
peculiar one. He has to deal with life, and all those mys- 
terious possibilities that exist in the living creature have to 
be reckoned with in his operations. It is not a matter of fixed 
rules. No man can map out a system which will apply to all 
cases and give a definite result with absolute certainty. The 
successful breeder requires a thorough knowledge of his busi- 
ness and the ability to reason accurately, so that he may modify 
his methods and adapt them to the requirements of each in- 
dividual problem which comes before him. Knowledge of 
general principles can be acquired from books, but the success- 
ful application of those principles must be learned, very largely, 
in the school of experience. 
Theory and practice must go hand in hand, and knowledge 
must be combined with reason; but the really great breeder 
seems to possess a sort of intuitive genius given to the very 
few, and hence great breeders are not common. 
Another thing necessary to success is a love for animals. 
If a man dislikes hogs, he had better not attempt to breed 
them, because failure is sure to follow. It is the enthusiastic 
lover of a breed of animals who will make the greatest success 
of breeding them. 
Finally, there can be no progress unless the breeder has a 
very clear ideal before him towards which he is working, which 
implies, of course, that he must be a thorough judge of the 
breed he handles. He may never reach his ideal, but he 
must never lose sight of it. No matter how much money may 
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