148 
Rcdriiuj of Calves. 
which takes from its excellence. Respiration is a species of 
combustion ; at every breath we inhale oxygen from the atmos- 
phere, which unites with and consumes the fatty matter in the 
food. Cows when overdriven or worried breathe more fre- 
quently, inhale more oxygen, and c()nse([uently more of the 
buttery portion of their food is consumed, leaving less to impart 
richness to the milk. On this account, in very hot weather, it 
is well to house cows by day, thus relieving them from the irritat- 
ing attacks of flies, and to turn them out at night ; on the other 
hand, it is well known to experienced dairymen that their cows 
yield more milk in warm, pleasant weather when they have the 
run of a sheltered pasture, than on a bleak field in cold, rainy 
days — a difference which the same theory of respiration equally 
accounts for. 
The old, and 1 trust almost exploded, system of giving medicine 
to the calf, in order to cause it to expel the first glutinous faeces 
(or meconium), is so contrary to nature that it must be censured. 
The delicate intestines of a newly-born calf are not prepared for 
castor-oil or spirits. Let its own mother's first milk, colostrum, 
or beistyn, be given two or three hours after birth ; it is nature s 
medicine, unfit for human use, but prepared with a wisdom be- 
yond ours to meet the. requirements of the newly-born calf. This 
" colostrum " appears at every delivery, and from its peculiar 
nature produces a purgative action, and causes the " meconium " 
to be voided, which, for some time before birth, has been form- 
ing in the intestines of the calf 
We have heard of an egg-shell filled with spirits being put 
down, the unfortunate animal's throat — the spii'its to invigorate, 
and the egg-shell to clear the way and lubricate the passage to 
the stomach. Some give the egg, yolk, white, shell and all ; 
and in Ireland, that panacea of all Hibernian woes — whisky — 
is thought to be the " elixir of life " for calves, though it must 
be said that the sister kingdom of England has its breeders, and 
some of celebrity, who do not fail to administer the glass of 
spirits in every case where a calf is born. 
By thus early overtaxing the stomach and thwarting nature 
in its well-ordered course, the seeds of delicacy are surely sown. 
Medicine should not be tolerated until there is actual cause for 
its use, and then let it be administered by some one who can not 
only judge of the disease, but suggest a remedy to meet it. I 
hold it to be a great mistake to overload the stomach of a newly- 
drop})e(l calf; so I consider the "beistyn" should be given in 
small quantities at a time, and, in the case of a healthy calf, not 
until it has strength to stand, as it is clear it could not suck its 
mother until it had so far progressed. 
Should any apprehension be felt respecting the inactivity of a 
