as Compared vAth Artificial Manures. 
119 
any trutli at all in tliera, a great loss must be sustained by 
an unvarying system of turning all kinds of produce into meat, 
and fondly nursing the idea tliat if the value is not returned by 
the meat produced, the dung produced will make up all losses 
in the long run. Of course, meat might get very dear, and 
fann produce of so little value to sell, that it might be turned 
into meat. Artificial manures might also become dearer. In 
fact, the price of almost everything varies from time to time, so 
that no rigid system can be always right, unless it is to buy in 
the cheapest and sell in the dearest market, whenever it is at 
all possible to do so. 
I shall now give a short account of my own personal es- 
perience in fattening cattle, and also on the use of artificial 
manures. For a good many years I managed farms for gentle- 
men in various districts. On every farm a good many cattle 
were fattened, chiefly with the object of making manure. In 
some cases cattle were house- fed throughout the whole year, 
summer as well as winter. The land was on the whole fairly 
good, and the crops produced were generally good also. The 
results, however, of the whole system of farming were that very 
small profits were made. The capital employed was large, the 
percentage obtained for it on the average was very small. In a 
few cases of weighing the cattle alive and proving the rate of 
increase by the carcase weights, rather under 8 lbs. of carcase 
weight per week was obtained. My experience therefore, as 
far as it went, showed that an increase of about 8 lbs. per week, 
as stated in the Woburn experiments, was a fair average in- 
crease. 
Since I commenced farming, thirty-three years ago, on my 
own account, a different system has been followed from that 
which gentlemen of large means thought proper to adopt. My 
farm of 300 acres contains about 240 acres of arable land. For 
a time one fourth of the arable, 60 acres, was devoted to growing 
swedes and mangolds. The average crops have not exceeded 
10 tons per acre : sometimes 20 to 30 tons, another time 10 tons, 
down to nothing with swedes, and in wet seasons only a few 
tons of mangolds per acre. 
For several winters about 60 head of cattle were fed in open 
yards, and consumed about 1^ cwt. of roots each per day. The 
whole of the straw was consumed as food and litter. The rate 
of increase of meat, carcase weight, was only about 6 lbs. per 
week. During 20 weeks' feeding, the money return per week 
ranged from 4s. to Gs., according to the progress of the beasts 
and the price of meat. In open yards the cattle made about 
half a ton of dung each per week. In a tabular form it may be 
observed that by charging a low value for the swedes and 
