298 
Farming of Buckinghamshire. 
limits is very considerable. The grazing land is confined to certain 
localities, but dairying extends over a much larger area. There 
is an excellent dairy of superb Alderneys at Little Horwood, but 
the cows principally kept are the shorthorns ; and Bucks may 
freely challenge any county south of tlie Trent to produce a more 
extensive or better assortment of milch cows ; they are well bred, 
have large frames, and are excellent milkers. The credit of 
breeding these useful animals does not belong to the county, as 
they are mostly imported as 3-year old heifers from Yorkshire 
and Lincolnshire. But few are reared in Bucks ; some of the 
cow-calves may be weaned by the arable farmers and on the third- 
rate pastures of the north. A lot of 70 or 80 were reared the 
year before last at Aston Abbotts; but the dairyman mostly buys 
in his stock, and, after milking them for three or four years, tries 
to dispose of them for London cows. There is always a ready 
sale for these animals at high prices ; and provided a cow has 
a great frame, a large forward udder, and the appearance of being 
a good milker, she is quickly bought up by the dealers. When 
they are springing for calving they will commonly fetch from 
18/. to 20 guineas each. Of course this pays well enough, but 
comparatively few are sufficiently good for the London men ; and, 
independently of losses, so many turn barren, that the difference 
between the buying-in and selling-out price is frequently on 
the losing side. About three acres of good dairy land will 
keep a cow the twelve months. As an instance of the quantity 
of stock kept on a dairy farm, the occupier of 300 acres of 
second-rate grass land has, during the summer, 80 or 90 cows, 
and 100 couples : 120 acres are mown for hay. The dairyman 
tries to reduce his stock for the winter, and so sells off his Lon- 
don, barren, and useless cows in the fall of the year. The dry 
cows do not get much hay, but a cow in milk during the winter 
will eat two tons, and the addition of one oilcake per day is found 
to be well-spent money. Most frequently the milch cows subsist 
entirely on hay, and are seldom supplied with roots or any arti- 
ficial food. In one or two instances, where cows have been fed 
on swedes, the judicious admixture of saltpetre has appeared to 
remove the unpleasant flavour of the butter, for it has made in 
London quite as much as some from adjoining dairies, where the 
cows were restricted exclusively to hay. It is best to give the 
roots directly after the cows are milked. When the hay is at all 
damaged, and indeed in all seasons when the price of butter is at 
all remunerative, giving cows a few mangolds, and even turnips 
and cabbages, or a little oilcake, meal, and grains, pays by the 
increased produce, Ijesides improving the condition of the cows 
and the quality of the manure. The management of the dairy is 
well understood ; and though conducted in a clean and economi- 
