Pure and Mixed Linseed- Cakes. 41 
I was informed had killed several beasts, and done serious in- 
jury to others. This cake on analysis yielded the following 
results : — 
Moistui-c 10-4'2 . 
Oil 8-92 
* Albuminous compounds (flesh-forming niattcis) .. 17 '25 
Starch, mucilage, and digestible fibre 37 "95 
Woody fibre (cellulose) 17 '70 
t Mineral matter (ash) 7 • 76 
100-00 
* Containing nitrogen 2 '76 
+ Containing sand 2*8r> 
It will be seen that this cake was deficient in oil, very poor in 
albuminous compounds, and richer in woody fibre than genuine 
linseed-cake. On further examination 1 found that it did not 
become gelatinous at all on digestion with distilled water, that 
it hardly contained any linseed, and was almost entirely com- 
posed of a host of weed-seeds like the seeds which I enumerated 
in a former page, when speaking of the nature of the seeds 
which constitute the screenings or siftings from linseed. In 
point of fact this cake was hardly better than the siftings-cake 
of which I have already given an analysis, and to which I 
would refer the reader for a comparison with the preceding 
analytical results. 
We have here a practical illustration of the injurious proper- 
ties of linseed-siftings, and the danger which the purchaser of 
cheap cakes (made from very foul linseed) runs of doing injury to 
his stock when he feeds them upon such cake. 
Generally speaking, inferior or adulterated linseed-cakes do net 
become very gelatinous when mixed with water, and not unfre- 
quently have an acid taste, and are destitute of the peculiar nice 
flavour which distinguishes pure linseed-cake. 
Many farmers like cakes in which they can clearly recognise 
Iragments of linseed ; and they regard it as a proof of good qualitv 
if a cake presents to the eye some apparently uncrushed linseeds. 
It is not safe, however, to rely upon the visible presence of 
whole linseeds as a test of the good quality of a cake, for in 
apparently some of the worst samples a good many whole un- 
crushed linseeds are frequently visible. Oil-cake makers, awars 
of the habit of many farmers to look out for whole linseeds in 
cake, simply add a proportion of whole linseed to the mixture 
of cheap feeding materials which they intend to convert into 
linseed-cake, and by this means give it a character which some 
regard as an indication of genuineness. 
