REMARKS ON THE USE OF MULES. 139 



have discovered are no good for mule breeding, are care- 

 fully palmed off on the English buyers. It is a common 

 thing for the captains of English steamers engaged in 

 trading with Spanish ports to bring home a jack or two 

 on speculation ' on their own account ; it may be taken 

 almost as a certainty that such animals are useless, and 

 that they have been carefully kept for this particulai^ 

 market. At the same time it must be owned that, apart 

 from colour, very excellent big-boned jacks can be 

 obtained in Southern Spain, but considerable care and 

 technical knowledge must be exercised in making the 

 purchases. 



] Seeing that our breeds of stock are so much sought 

 after, it seems strange that, except iu a few isolated 

 instances, no attempt should have been' made generally to 

 improve the British donkey, and so give him the rank and 

 position pertaining to a jack. It may be said that a 

 donkey is a donkey all over the world ; but the difference 

 between a donkey and a jack is as great as that between a 

 tramp and a King. Directly a male member of the 

 asinine race has size, bone, and substance enough to be 

 used as a jack, his value is increased enormously. A 

 donkey in London is worth from 21. to bl. A jack (or 

 baudet) in Poitou is worth from lOOZ. to 400Z.J some 

 years ago, when the writer was in Kentucky, he was 

 assured by Mr. B. B. Groom, who will be remembered by 

 old Shorthorn breeders, that more than one jack had been 

 sold in Kentucky for ^5000 (lOOOL). Looking at the 

 never-failing demand from our colonies for jacks at good 

 prices, it might perhaps be worth the while of enterprising 

 British agriculturists to turn their attention to the pro- 

 duction of this class of stock. 



Mules have been bred in the south of Ireland for many 



