Manaf/emciU of Cattle. 
451 
supplying it, to select animals possessing feeding qualities, with- 
out which all our efforts will prove unsatisfactory. 
Not being prepared with any experiments sufficiently detailed 
for insertion here, as to the value and feeding qualities of different 
sorts of food, I shall merely state in general terms the result of 
my own observations. I am, moreover, by no means satisfied that 
any single experiment, or even a series of them, are or ought to 
be at all conclusive when we examine praclically the difficulty of 
the question they are required to decide. For instance, suppose 
six oxen are taken to test the effects of two different modes of 
fattening : three to be treated upon one system and three upon the 
other. How difficult it is we all know to select six animals from 
any drove, however large, possessing in the same degree equal 
and similar qualifications ; and hence the difficulty — I may almost 
say impossibility — of deciding fairly by any experimental results. 
Two out of the six oxen may be diseased and unable to digest 
properly, and cannot consequently assimilate their food. In 
many trials, which have been made to test the value of different 
roots, &c., so far as I am aware no conclusive results have been 
arrived at ; in some instances being in favour of one article of 
food, and in some of another. A close and careful observation 
in our daily practice of the different effects of food and treatment 
is, I think, more likely to lead to correct conclusions than a too 
great reliance upon experiments which manifestly must always be 
conducted under a considerable degree of doubt and uncertainty. 
A moderate tjuantity of roots (turnips in winter, and mangold- 
wurtzel in the warmer weather of spring), combined with a limited 
portion of artificial food, will prove more fattening than an un- 
limited supply of both. From 2J to 3 bushels of swedes, and 2 
bushels of mangold-wurtzel with from 7 to 10 lbs. of linseed-cake 
or meal per day, of various sorts, mixed up in cut hay, I usually 
find sufficient for the generality of bullocks. If a little long Jiay 
can be spared it is a valuable addition, as encouraging the proper 
process of rumination and thereb} promoting and preserving health. 
It would be absurd and unprofitable to attempt to lay down 
any precise rule as to what sort of artificial food should be used ; 
and it appears to me that they who attempt to decide peremptorily 
on this matter are apt to forget one important point, namely, the 
relative prices of these different descriptions of food. When 
linseed-cake is at a high price and grain at a low one, it will 
naturally occur to the consumer to use the cheaper commodity ; 
and thus, in certain seasons and under peculiar circumstances, 
that system, which might be a profitable and a proper one to 
adopt, would, under a different state of things, prove wholly in- 
applicable. 
The production of the greatest quantity of beef in proportiori 
