times as much as his wild relative, and has developed remarkable 

 qualities of mind and body from his association with man. Among 

 wild cattle the female produces just enough milk to suckle her calf, 

 while the domestic breeds most famous as "milkers" — the Hol- 

 steins and Ayrshires — will yield their own weight in milk every 

 twenty or thirty clays. Both the quality of the milk and the 

 period of lactation have also been immensely influenced by breed- 

 ing. Other varieties of cattle, as the Durhams and Herefords, are 

 bred for beef, while the Devons are noted for their excellent 

 qualities as yoke oxen. Our modern horses, also, illustrate in 

 many ways the art of the 'breeder. Originally serving man as a 

 pack animal, the horse soon became the indispensable companion 

 of the traveler and the merchant, and in course of time acquired a 

 place of inestimable importance in warfare. The steed of the 

 Norman knight was the noblest horse that the world had ever 

 seen, and from him are descended the finest draught animals of 

 the present day. Neither the Norman knight, however, or any 

 of his contemporaries ever dreamed of the excitement of the 

 modern race track, or fancied that the prize horses of the Derby 

 would win their laurels by whisking a light-weight jockey around 

 the circle in a ball-bearing sulky, and not, forsooth, by carrying a 

 lusty baron and two hundredweight of armor in the tournament. 

 Both in England and in this country the most careful attention 

 has been given to increasing the speed of the horse. Seventy- 

 five years ago the running record was three minutes. In 1865 

 Legal Tender ran in 1 :44, a record that is equalled or excelled on 

 every race-course in the country today. In 1843 a trotting record 

 of 2 :30 was established. In 1894, fifty years later, the number 

 of horses on record that had trotted a mile in 2 :30 or less was 

 over 7,500, and rapidly increasing. Twenty-three horses at this 

 date had records ranging from 2 :04 (Nancy Hanks) to 2 :10. Thus 

 within the past century the American horsemen have developed a 

 distinct breed of horses, and all by the persevering application of 

 the principles of artificial selection for four or five successive 

 generations. At the same time, we have not neglected the per- 

 petuation and improvement of other serviceable breeds of horses, 

 adapted to the plow and the road. The mule, a hybrid that owes its 

 existence to the enterprise of the stock-breeder, is one of our 



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