1872.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
411 
Two Jersey Bulls— (*<' First Page) 
The engraving on Hie first page of this paper 
represents two Jersey bulls, and probably two 
as fine of their kind as there are in the United 
States. Each is a representative animal, and 
may be taken as a type of the excellence of 
its special class of Jersey stock. 
" Beacon Comet," the upper animal, belongs to 
that style of Jerseys known as fawn and white 
with light points. His color is a bright fawn, 
gradually shaded into lighter tints, which can 
hardly be called white and yet is not fawn — 
possibly cream-color would better describe the 
tint. He is eight years old, and the progenitor 
of eight later Comets, one of which, "Beacon 
Comet 8th," took two first premiums, one for the 
best two-year bull, and another with three cows 
in the first Jersey herd premium at the last New 
York State Fair at Elmira. This prize was 
taken in competition with a herd imported 
directly from the farm of Queen Victoria. 
" Beacon Comet " has been the recipient of first 
premiums also wherever he has been a compe- 
titor. It is unnecessary to describe him more 
particularly. The engraving is an excellent 
portrait, and exhibits his points very accurately. 
He is the property of William Crozier, Esq., of 
Beacon Stock Farm, near Nortbport, L. I. 
The bull" Wachusett" is a magnificent animal 
of that class distinguished by black points; the 
points of the horns', tongue, muzzle, and switch 
being black, and he has the light ring around 
the muzzle strongly marked. His figure is ex- 
tremely fine; the horns are small and fine; the 
neck is tapering; and the head, handsomely 
put on, is very delicate, and in fine proportion 
with the neck and body. He has but very little, 
dewlap, and the tail is extremely slender, with 
a switch that sweeps the ground. He was 
awarded the first prize, at the New England 
Fair iu 1871, and would be difficult to beat any- 
where. His age is five years, his weight about 
1,600 pounds, and he is the property of L. A. 
Chase, Esq., of Herdsdale, Floreuce, Mass. 
Both these bulls are represented in their ordi- 
nary condition, and not as gotten up for show. 
Their owners are breeders who believe in thus 
keeping up their stock, both bulls and cows, 
and not in the idea, uufortunately too prevalent, 
that Jerseys make a better appearance, and are 
better performers at the pail and the churn, by 
being kept in poor condition and made to 
show too much bone and too much belly. 
Two Cents a Quart for Milk. 
Mr. George Geddes, in a communication to 
the Tribune, says that farmers generally would 
do better to sell their milk, as they first strain it, 
for two cents per quart than to make it into 
butter and cheese; that when they do so con- 
vert it they get only that price, losing their labor 
in the dairy. It is bad enough to say this, but 
Mr. Geddes clinches the nail by proving it — 
which is worse. These are his figures : It takes 
14 quarts of milk to make a pound of butter, 
and a pound of butter is worth, in New York, 
only an average price of less than 22 cents per 
pound ; 14 quarts of milk make three pounds 
of cheese, worth at the present an average price 
of 9i cents per pound. This is not a cheerful 
computation, but it is one which the "average 
farmer" must needs accept, and it indicates very 
clearly that if he hopes for any brilliant success 
he mnst in some way get Above the average, 
and a good deal above it. 
It is estimated by Mr. Willard that the average 
annual produce of the dairy cows of America 
is eitfier 100 lbs. of butter or 360 lbs. of cheese, 
representing an average annual produce of say 
about 1,500 quarts of milk, bringing, at 2c. per 
quart, $30. So low an average as this must 
cover an enormous number of very poor cows, 
kept by farmers who are, in intelligence and 
enterprise, very fur below those who support 
agricultural papers, and it would be unfair to 
address any argument to the readers of the 
Agriculturist based on the practice of this class. 
So far as we can judge, those who are known 
by their neighbors as good farmers — who are 
very much above the average of their locality — 
usually get a yearly yield, taking one cow with 
another, of about 2,250 quarts of milk. This, 
if made into butter, brings in $45, and the 
skimmed mill; and buttermilk are worth enough 
to pay a fair compensation for the labor of the 
dairy. As they are kept, probably 1} acre of 
meadow and two acres of pasture will support 
the cow throughout the year. The return, then, 
is equal to $12.85 per acre. It enables a thrifty 
man (with a 100-acre farm), who raises his own 
supply of meat and vegetables, to maintain a 
family decently, to lay by a trifle each year, and 
to die with the soothing consciousness that he 
has done his duty. He has worked hard, has 
kept the wolf from the door, has educated his 
family better than he was educated himself, has 
sent two strapping boj's into the world to be 
something else than farmers, and has settled the 
duller one on the farm, where he, in his turn, 
will pass an industrious and faithful life in 
making both ends meet — or lap by just a little. 
If any one thinks that agriculture is to be made 
an attractive occupation by reason of the ex- 
amples that such men set, he is vastly mistaken. 
So long as fidelity, industiy, and thrift can 
secure only this meager share of the rewards of 
faithful labor, so long will the more intelligent 
sons carry their labor to fields which promise 
the bare possibility of something better — where, 
if failure is probable, success is at least possible. 
Every well-organized American boy is ambi- 
tious, and no youthful ambition is going to be 
satisfied with $19.85 per acre. Unless we can 
make a much better showing than that, we may 
as well give it up at once. 
But we can. Dairying is as good a branch of 
farming as we can ftdopt. Let us stick to it. 
Brilliant success in its prosecution demands 
three conditions: 1st, a high price for butter (or 
cheese) ; 2d, a fair yield of milk from each and 
every cow; 3d, a large percentage of butter 
from a given quantity of milk. Never mind 
"average" men now — we are talking about 
brilliant men, men whose success will be worth 
more in helping others to improve than would 
all the preaching we could do in a lifetime. 
We base our proposition on the fact that really 
fine butter will never lack a market at an extra 
price. Not fine this week and week after next, 
and pretty good at some other time, but sure to 
be A 1 fifty-two weeks of the year. No in- 
fluence that can be brought to bear will secure 
an increase of this sort of butter so rapid as the 
increase of the demand for it. Any dairy with 
a fixed reputation for such butter is sure of at 
least 44c. per pound over all expenses of sale. 
This raises the price of the milk to four cents 
per quart instead of two, and the yield to 
$25.70 per acre. How much better than this 
may be done depends on the man. Ogden Farm 
gets 90c, Darlington gets $1, Sargent gets $1.15 
— and everyone of these earns it by the quality 
and tlie uniformity of his product. A hundred 
women who read this will say their butter is as 
good as either of the above can produce. To 
ninety-nine of them we say : " You are entirely 
mistaken; you have no idea what really good 
butter is, and until you find out you must not 
wonder at your poor returns." 
The yield of milk per cow is no less import- 
ant than the method of manufacture. It takes 
so many pounds of food to maintain the life of 
so many pounds of cow — whether she gives five 
quarts or twenty-five. The profit comes from 
her ability to use still more pounds of food and 
convert it into milk. Any man who has a 
genius for dairying will go through his herd and 
draft out all the second-class cows he has, and 
sell them for the best price be can get — and 
then buy as many first-class cows as he can 
afford. If any one of our readers fails to see 
the point of this without argument, he is not 
the stuff from which the brilliant dairyman is 
to be made ; he will have to wait until some 
brighter neighbor sets him an example — by es- 
tablishing a herd that will produce 3,000 quarts 
per head, and raise the average returns to 
$33.93 per acre. Then will follow the attention 
to quality as well as to quantity. Instead of 14 
quarts of milk to the pound of butter, a careful 
selection of cows for butter production will 
secure a pound of butter from 10 quarts of milk 
— averaging from his whole herd "00 lbs. of 
butter, bringing a return (at 44c.) of $132 per 
cow, or $37.71 per acre. 
In support of the above, we would stale that 
we know now a herd of under-sized cows which 
produce, in butter alone, an annual average of 
over $150, and what has been done once can 
be done again. 
Ogden Farm Papers.— No. 34. 
— • — 
Mr. W. H. Scarboro, of Payson, 111., writes 
to ask several questions of general interest. 
Referring to my statement that if it will not 
pay to buy hay to feed, it will not pay to feed 
what we raise, he wants a clearer explanation, 
saying: "If you raise hay and it costs j-ou $8 
per ton, and you feed it out and make $16 per 
ton out of it, you have a clear profit of $8, 
while it might not be worth $16 in the market. 
But if you have to buy hay at $16, you get 
no profit from its consumption." — The answer 
to this is that profit from hay and profit from 
feeding are not the same thing. If you raise 
hay at $8 and sell it at $16, you make just as 
much profit as though you fed it to cows and 
got your $16 in that way. If it is only worth 
$10 in the market, and is worth $16 to feed, 
then you can afford to buy it. The principle is 
simply this : The hay in the barn is worth the 
market price — what it will fetch, or what it 
could be replaced for — without reference to 
where it came from. If 5 - ou have animals you 
must feed, or if you have no other way to make 
needed manure, then you must feed out your 
own hay, though you might sell it for more than 
your cows will return, or, if your supply is short, 
you must buy at whatever is the market price. 
It seems clear to me that my original statement 
is quite right, that, if I can't afford to feed out 
hay that I buy, I can't afford to feed out hay 
that I raise. In feeding my own hay I have the 
advantage of having a good customer, and I 
escape the annoyance of having to buy and 
pay resuly money, but if it is not worth so much 
to feed as it is to sell (not worth the market price 
of hay) I shall really lose as much money as 
though I had bought it — instead of only refrain- 
ing from selling it. Of course it is understood 
that a part of the profit in feeding is returned in 
the form of manure, and manure from purchased 
hay is worth as much (if from as good haj^ as 
from that raised on the farm. 
