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Management of Devon Cattle. 
now seldom grown. Working Devon oxen, killed at the age of 
six years, sometimes weighed from sixty to seventy score. In 
many of the steer-breeding herds of the present time, milk has the 
same subordinate place in the economy of management which 
it held in the days of the ox-team. 
The quality of Devon milk is unquestionably good, and always 
was so. This is a fact, bearing, no doubt, upon the superior grazing 
powers of the breed. The rich sustenance supplied to the calves 
of every successive generation in the early stages of growth lays 
upon the frame of the calf the foundation of a generous muscular 
superstructure, and gives the aptitude to fatten readily. Start- 
ing with this advantage, the Devon steer-breeder has to see that 
in the after-treatment he does not throw it away. The loss of 
the mellow calf ’s-flesh grown upon milk is a waste for ever. The 
steer calves, after weaning (and the same rule applies to those 
fed from the pail), are usually treated more liberally than the 
heifers, to keep them going forward, without a check, in the 
direction of their destination. But the heifers intended for the 
breeding of steers should not be impoverished ; nor, on the other 
hand, should they be so kept as to favour the growth of too much 
fat and proportionate deterioration of the muscle, or lean meat. 
The system, which long practice has established by successful 
results, of keeping the future dams of steers in gentle and 
constant growth, and in moderate condition as they grow, con- 
forms to the demands of that law of nature which rules the 
transmission of characteristics modified, and of characteristics 
acquired, under domestication; the law by which a race, wild or 
subjugated, free, or under human control, adapts itself to the 
circumstances of life. 
In some herds we find that the cows, excepting any reserved 
for the supply of the house, do little or no more than rear their 
calves, either by suckling, or by what they yield to the hand ; but 
the milk-yield of the Devon appears to have increased generally 
from its average quantity SO or 100 years ago, so far as we can 
judge, by comparison of the reputation of the Devon in former 
times with what we see in the herds of to-day. 
There are two systems of rearing in steer-breeding herds — the 
suckling system and hand-feeding. In the former the calves 
are weaned at ages ranging usually from three to four or five 
months ; some cows rear more than one calf, setting free others 
for the supply of the house, or for any additional profit which 
may be got through the dairy. Indeed, the dairy and the pro- 
duction of beef often divide in various proportions the attention 
of the farmer ; so that between the dairy business proper and 
the business of exclusive beef-making there are so many 
