i53 



THE AYRSHIRE COW. 



Hon. John Stewart, Elburn, 111. : 



Ladies and Gentlemen : I am sorry to say that I will not be 

 able to interest you perhaps as much as you may expect. I am 

 not an orator or a public speaker, notwithstanding I have had 

 the misfortune to be in the legislature a couple of terms. 



I will simply say in regard to the Ayrshire cow that I have 

 had a little experience in that line, and can tell you a very little 

 about that. 



The Ayrshire cow, as many of you know, has been pro- 

 duced in Scotland by three or four hundred years of breeding, 

 principally in the low lands of Scotland. By long lines of breed- 

 ing they have produced a breed of cattle which they call Ayr- 

 shires, and which they claim was produced simply by feeding 

 and milking in a country where they wanted milk more than 

 anything else. The Ayrshire cow is not as large as the Hol- 

 stein. In their own country, as I saw them about three years 

 ago, they will run about twelve hundred weight when fit to kill. 

 They do not raise them as much for beef as they do for milk. 

 They are red and white, of rather a fine make, not coarse made, 

 being rather of a nervous temperament, but docile when well 

 cared for. 



It is true that in this country we have never had many 

 Ayrshire cows. There was quite a number imported about 

 sixty years ago into some of the eastern states, and a few have 

 straggled out into this country and you will find once in a while 

 a man who says he has some Ayrshire cows, but I never found 

 a herd of Ayrshire cows in the state of Illinois except one that 

 I have. I have about one hundred head of pure Ayrshire cows 

 that I have imported within the last fifteen years and bred from 

 those that I imported. They are good milkers, hardy, and I 

 like them very well and they suit me. I have none for sale and 

 consequently I have made no advertisements, and I have kept 

 no particular record that I could give in regard to the Ayrshire 



