1881.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST 
149 
ing, which had been sold in the Chicago 
stock-yards and shipped thence to New York. 
It seems this was the first lot of Polled beef 
cattle ever offered in any American market. 
Mr. Clark’s farm is at Victoria, Kansas, where 
he was associated with the founder of that 
English colony, the late George Grant. At 
Mr. Grant's death, Mr. Clark bought his 
Polled Angus bull, an imported animal of 
rare excellence, and has used him and his 
progeny from that time on upon grade 
Shorthorn cows, with marked success. 
Eight years ago the herd was begun by the 
selection of the best Cherokee heifers that 
•could be bought. These were round-bar¬ 
relled and neat every way, close made and 
fine boxed, none of them being loose or 
coarse. They were bred to good Shorthorn 
and Angus bulls, and their female progeny 
■of several generations formed the herd as it 
now exists—as a rule admirably formed cows, 
good handlers in every way, and hornless. 
It is now at least ten years since Mr. A. B. 
Allen and myself, writing independently, 
but after consultation, and from purely dis¬ 
interested motives, began to advocate Polled 
bulls for use on the plains and in Texas, the 
argument being that they were among the 
best known breeds of beef cattle ; that hav¬ 
ing no horns they would be less dangerous 
for men to handle, and for horses to be 
among, and besides, less likely to hurt one an¬ 
other, both at pasture and crowded upon the 
cars, and having less fear of one another, 
could be moved with less worry and less 
shrinkage. These beautiful cattle are the 
best demonstration that could be wished for 
of the correctness of these views. Mr. F. 
Joseph, the drover who handled them in the 
New York Market, in a letter to the editor 
of the before-mentioned journal, states that 
these steers were as nice as any ever killed 
in this city of their weight. “The beef was 
uniform—one steer like the other, and as 
white as marble.” They averaged alive 1,340 
pounds each, and dressed 62 pounds to the 
100. They averaged also 140 pounds of fat 
and 106 pounds of hide each, making the use¬ 
ful portion of each steer 1,076 pounds, or 
over 80 per cent of the live weight. Besides 
.this the quality of the beef was of the best. 
Now, these steers were larger than ordinary 
pure Angus steers would have been. They 
had not had a first-rate chance, or rather Mr. 
Clark sold them as yearlings, and though 
well cared for they had not been forced at 
all. They combined the good qualities of 
three breeds. The Cherokees could give 
them little that is valuable, besides hardiness. 
The Shorthorns or Durhams, as they are 
popularly called, gave size, early maturity, 
and fattening tendencies, while the Angus 
cross improved the “quality,” in everyway 
gave the Angus style (depth and roundness 
•of barrel, well ribbed back, and in general 
breadth and squareness of outline which is 
remarkable), and made them hornless. 
Mr. Clark has some 500 or more of these 
cows, of which he annually sells the steer 
•calves, at very good prices, for other farmers 
to raise and fatten. He calls them “ Angus- 
Durhams,” as indeed they are, but he calls 
them a breed, or the beginning of a breed, 
which I hold they are not, and never should 
be. Their superior qualities are in a great 
degree owing to their being cross breeds— 
that is, the progeny of pure bulls of one breed 
.(Angus), on nearly pure cows of another 
/(Durhams). Thus, according to law, he 
might expect the combined excellencies of 
both breeds, and this he obtains. Now, if 
he breeds Angus-Durliam bulls upon Angus- 
Durham cows, long suppressed—“bred out” 
—tendencies, qualities and “ points” will be 
almost certain to appeal - , the new breed will 
be reduced in size, in constitution ; they will 
not be so good feeders, gs their ancestors, and 
their proportions will not be so excellent. 
A Place for Earm Tools. 
In the February number we gave an illus¬ 
tration of “aportion of a well-arranged 
Tool-house.” In it the forks, shovels, etc., 
are inverted, and stand in holes bored in side 
shelves. The accompanying engraving shows 
another portion of a tool-house arranged for 
PORTION OF A TOOL HOUSE. 
such tools as can not be set in holes. The 
short, or D-liandled shovels, forks, scoops, 
etc., are hung by their handles to stout pins, 
driven in at frequent intervals along the 
scantling frame-work of the side of the 
house. Two long, stout pins are fastened on 
opposite sides and near the top of one of the 
posts, for the safe keeping of wooden hand 
rakes, etc. Pins may be placed elsewhere. 
C!ose-Br<‘('ding—Is it Injurious? 
—Close-breeding is the coupling of those ani¬ 
mals that are closely related to each other. 
The Jersey bull, “Mercury”—a portrait and 
account of which was given last November—is 
a son of ‘ ‘ Alphea ” by her brother, ‘ ‘ Jupiter. ” 
This is a good illustration of very close-breed¬ 
ing. Close-breeding is a means of perpetuat¬ 
ing those qualities that are common to the 
animals coupled. If good points predomi¬ 
nate in the animals, close-breeding will tend 
to fix them ; if bad qualities are common to 
the animals, they are quite sure to be found 
in the offspring. In itself, there is nothing 
injurious in close-breeding. If the breeder 
starts with excellent animals, according to 
the general law of: “ Like produces Like,” 
excellent animalp will be the result, with the 
good points more firmly fixed. It is in this 
way that many excellent strains or families 
have been built up. Under ordinary condi¬ 
tions of the animals, and by unskilled men, 
close-breeding is not to be recommended. 
“A Live Harrow.” 
“D. S., Jr.,” Preston Co., West Va., has 
certainly a right to be heard, for he not only 
claims that he “has been a subscriber for 30 
years,” but he moreover claims that we shall 
regard him “as a life-long subscriber,” for 
the reason that in each one of these many 
years he has “always got his money back.” 
After this pleasantry, we are prepared to find 
that the outlines of his “Live Harrow,” which 
he has not patented, but which he has found 
of great service in his farm operations, are 
contained “within a lot of salt-hungry 
sheep.” Among his other reasons for his 
faith in their utility, he cites the following : 
“ I had at one time a 4-acre lot of new ground 
that I wished to get into grass as a permanent 
pasture. The lot was literally covered with 
stumps and boulders, but with a one-horse 
shovel-plow, I managed to scratch all the 
ground that was ‘ come-at-able,’ sowed it to 
wheat and grass. I then had about two 
dozen head of sheep, and having first dropped 
a small quantity of salt, at intervals of about 
two rods, all over the field, the sheep were 
let on. In less than half an hour, that field 
had been so thoroughly trampled over by the 
sheep that scarcely a grain of wheat could be 
seen. The result was an excellent stand of 
wheat, and an equally good catch of grass. 
Encouraged by this success, our correspon¬ 
dent has tried the same “ Live Harrow ” upon 
ground free of stumps and stones, with most 
gratifying results. With regard to this kind 
of “ harrow,” he suggests that it should never 
be borrowed from a neighbor, but should 
“ always be home-made,” in other words, he 
would have the farmer raise his own sheep. 
He says: “In this mountain region, where 
land is cheap and productive, nothing pays 
so well as sheep.” If this pleasant way of re¬ 
garding a flock of sheep as a “ Live Harrow ” 
serves to call the attention of farmers in gen¬ 
eral to the profit that may result from the 
keeping of sheep, it will do good service. As 
workers of the ground, as cleaners of the 
land of weeds and brush of all sorts, 6heep 
will earn their living. The spring lambs, for 
home use or market, and the fleeces, may be 
regarded as clear profit. In all localities 
where there are effective dog-laws, sheep may 
be made most important factors in the econ¬ 
omy of even a small farm. Where there is 
no dog-law, the prospects of success are un¬ 
certain, and measures should be taken to 
suppress all the sheep-killing curs at once. 
A Post Holder. 
Those who use posts and rails for fencing, 
or even have only bar-posts to make, the rest 
of the fence being of the Virginia “ snake ” in 
some of its forms, will find a handy device in 
A HOLDER FOR POSTS. 
the post holder here presented. It consists 
of four pieces of timber—two long ones 
parallel upon the ground, and two shorter 
pieces resting upon those at right angles. 
These last pieces have a place cut out of the 
upper side for the post to fit into. A ring 
