Deskable Agricultural Experiments. 
259 
which no systematic attempt has ever been made, although for 
generations they have presented themselves to the minds of 
agriculturists as riddles which men of that class have felt that 
they ought to be able to answer. With respect to some of 
these questions, which might have been elucidated by a few 
well-arranged experiments, it may fairly be said to be astonish- 
ing that they have been neglected through all the decades of 
improving agriculture. There are also other problems, raised 
by modern research, which it is no discredit to living or dead 
agriculturists not to have solved ; and all that need be pleaded 
with respect to them is that they should not be treated with the 
same neglect as has been displayed in relation to older ques- 
tions. It is the object of this paper to suggest a few experi- 
ments, which any agricultural association possessing moderate 
funds might carry out, with a fair prospect of conferring a 
great and enduring advantage upon the farmers of the present 
and the future. 
Numerous and varied as agricultural experiments have been, 
it is strange that no well-known and publicly-conducted trial of 
the comparative consumption of food and production of meat or 
milk by cattle of the large and small breeds respectively has 
ever taken place in this country. The points in question have 
always been at issue, and if any attempt has ever been made to 
determine them, it is certain that no approach to a settlement 
has been attained. The small breeds have not yet become of 
much relative importance as meat-makers in this country, and 
therefore it is not sui-prising that their achievements in this 
respect, in comparison with those of the large breeds, have not 
been recorded. But the small breeds have long been of import- 
ance as producers of milk, and it is remarkable that no attempt 
should have been made to compare in this respect the average 
productiveness of good specimens of, say. Jerseys and iShorthorns. 
There are herd records of both breeds, it is true, but I have 
never seen any comparison of them upon an extensive scale. 
The relative productiveness in mea t or milk of any large and 
small breeds, however, is only part of the question upon which 
information is desirable. It would be useful to know whether, 
under given circumstances, a Hereford or a Dexter is the more 
profitable meat producer, and which would give the greater profit 
as a dairy cow — a Shorthorn or a Jersey. These are only 
typical examples of the comparisons which might be instituted. 
Others might be suggested, in which various large and small 
breeds, and middle-sized ones also, might be pitted against 
each other. It would suffice, however, for a beginning, to com- 
pare the profitableness of good examples of the large and small 
