editors’ address. 49 
field Club results in yielding the least proportionable quantity of 
meat of the coarsest and most unprofitable description by means 
of the most extravagant outlay .” 
The same paper, for the present year(77ie Times, for Dec. I Oth 
last), in an editorial article following up the same subject, asks the 
question, “ Will any body prove to us, by any rational consider- 
ations acknowledged in the ordinary business of life, that the 
Christmas Cattle Show, with its disagreeable consequences, does 
any recti good f u — “ To be worth any thing as an useful experi- 
ment, every fat beast ought to have a ledger, with a debtor and 
creditor account, hanging to its neck ; what the cost of the grass, 
hay, barley and bean-meal, carrots, mangold-wurtzel, cabbages, 
Swedes, pea-meal, oats, vetches, &c., the animal has devoured ; 
as also of its stabling, littering, and cleaning; as also its journey 
per rail, water, or van to the market : on the other side, what is 
the actual value of the product V' — “All that we have heard 
proves to us that it is an expensive hobby, even though people 
can be found silly enough to give the price of good food for mate- 
rial fit for nothing but kitchen candles.” 
The Morning Chronicle of the 16th ult. makes the follow- 
ing reply to the above criticisms : — “ A person should know 
something of the object of these exhibitions before he ventures to 
criticise them. Every one acquainted with farm stock knows one 
animal feeds more kindly than another, and that an ox or a sheep 
of particular breeds will, on the same quantity of food, make much 
more flesh than an ox or sheep of another breed. The disposition 
to fatten is the test of a good breed. Some fatten so easily, that 
they hardly require to be put up. This is the case in particular 
with the black kylo of the West Highlands of Scotland. The 
kylo is of so kindly a nature that it will fatten on any decent 
pasture, and it will perhaps make more flesh on the same quantity 
of food than any other ox. The reason why the Yorkshire cows 
are such favourites with the cow-feeders of London is, that they 
are both good milkers and good feeders, and that soon after milk- 
ing is over they can be put into a fit condition for the shambles.” 
“ The farmer does not suppose, when he succeeds in giving to 
an ox the weight of a Durham, or any other monstrosity of fat, 
that a delicate stomach can digest the meat from it. He only 
VOL. XX. H 
