1862.] 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
201 
Names of’Points with their Diseases— 1. The Muzzle including the chin, (2) lips and nostrils; 3. the Jaw; 
4. the Jowl; 5. the Nose; 6. the Eyebrow ; 7. the Eye, (the seat of various diseases causing blindness, weakness, 
flowing, etc., including glass eye, cataract, ophthalmia, exostosis, etc.); 8. the Forehead; 9. the Ears, (affected by 
inflammation, causing deafness) ; 10. the Poll, (the seat of poll evil) ; 11. the Crest, (sometimes spongy and fat, and 
afTected by mange) ; 12. the Withers, in which sometimes occurs fistula ; 13. the Shoulders ; 14. the Elbow', often in¬ 
jured, the seat of tumors; 15. the Back (saddle galls, sit-fasts, warbles, etc.); 16. the Girth, (broken lib); 17. the 
Belly; 18. the Flank; 19. the Throat (sore throat, laryngitis); 20. the Gullet; 21. Jugular vein; 22. Windpipe 
(bronchitis, injury from collar); 23. Point of Shoulder (contusions, lameness, and sprains); 24. Breast or bosom, 
(various internal diseases, chest founder, broken wind, etc., are located within the chest cavity) ; 25. the Elbow 
Joint; 26. the Fore Arm ; 27. the Knees, (knee-galls, abscesses, broken knee—by white spots showing a tendency to 
ztumble, knock-kneed, bow-kneed, weakness of the joint, etc.); 28. Cannon bone, (splents); 39. Tendons, often 
spongy, knotty, and the seat of wind galls and other injuries; 30. Fetlock Joint, (the seat of swellings, osseous en¬ 
largements, stiffness, wind-galls, etc.); 31. the Fetlock'; 32. the Pastern (ring-bone, fracture, wind-galls, cracking of 
the skin, etc ; ) 33. Heels, (grease); 34. Loins; 35. Croup, (occasional dislocation) ; 36. Dock, (injury by the croop- 
er, and mange) ; 37. Rump; 38. the Hip, (bruises, wounds, and fracture) ;.39. Quarters ; 40. the Stifle, (subject to 
dislocation, bruises, sprains, and whirl-bone lameness); 4). Thigh or Gaskin, (sprain, string halt); 42. Hamstring; 
43 and 45. the Hock, (blood spavin, bog spavin, bone spavin, capped hock, thorough-pin, curb, etc.); 44. the Hock- 
bone ; 46. Corona; 47 Toe ; 48. Walls of the hoof, (the Hoof, the seat of numerous diseases, must be explained on 
another occasion) ; 49. Sheath, (often foul). 
The Horse of all Work. 
It is a difficult thing to determine exactly 
what should he considered a perfect horse—for 
the perfection of any domestic animal consists 
in its adaptation to the service required of it— 
be it ox, cow, sheep, swine, or horse. The Eng¬ 
lish hunter is as near the type of a perfect horse 
of all work as can be found. It is particularly 
necessary for farmers who breed horses to study 
their points, particularly with reference to sires. 
A breeding horse should be sound in all respects, 
except blemishes caused by accidents or vio¬ 
lence, or by sickness which was neither inherit¬ 
ed nor can be transmitted. A good horse is mod¬ 
erately short-backed (12 to 34), and long below 
(17); round barreled and well ribbed up (16) ; 
rather high in the withers (12); having moder¬ 
ately sloping shoulders (12 to 23); a broad chest 
(24), a firm, and muscular crest (11), a head well 
set on, lean and bony, with a clear, bright, me¬ 
dium-sized, intelligent eye, an open, thin, broad 
nostril, clean muzzle, and small ears; his rump 
(35) should be straight, broad, and full; his loins 
(34) broad; legs above the knee (27) or hock (43) 
long and muscular. All the important muscles 
of the extremities are located above these points, 
and below them they should be short and bony, 
and the tendons (29) hard, and free from soft 
spots or excrescenses; the leg bones large, flat, 
and smooth; the pasterns (23)not too long or ob¬ 
lique ; hoofs hard, clean, deep, (not flat) round 
(on the ground) and good sized. The knees (27) 
and hocks (43) should be broad and bony, the 
quarters (39) large, broad, and muscular, square 
when seen from the rear, the shanks from the 
hock to the pastern short, hard, and clean. A 
horse can hardly have too deep and broad a 
chest, too strait a back from withers to croop, 
or too thin and delicate a neck near the head. 
Under the cut above we give the names of the 
various parts, and some of the blemishes and 
diseases of the parts. Many diseases are only 
known in fancy, and almost all are known by 
several different names. 
Shall we Spare the Crows and Blackbirds ? 
It is well to look at two sides of a question. 
We have argued even in favor of crows and 
blackbirds, and let our correspondent present 
the other side. Let the enemies of these exam¬ 
ine the maws of their victims and report the 
Contents, whither they be young birds, or corn, 
or beetles. We do not believe that blackbirds 
eat the young of other birds, but crows do. 
To the Editor of the American Agriculturist. 
Looking over the Agriculturist Calendar for 
May, I noticed the following : “ Birds—Spare 
them all; put up bird boxes, kill cats that kill 
birds, allow no guns to be fired on or near the 
premises,” Innocent birds should be protected, 
and a heavy fine should be paid by any one 
cruel enough to injure them. No one loves the 
sweet song of the Lark, the Goldfinch, or any 
other innocent or beautiful bird more than I do, 
but such birds as the vile crow and the more 
hateful blackbird I shall ever be at war with. 
The crow will rob the blackbird or any in¬ 
nocent bird it can find or catch, and the black¬ 
bird will do the same as far as it is able, and for 
this reason I shoot all the blackbirds and crows 
that I can hit with my rifle. I never shot a 
crow for pulling corn, but have shot dozens of 
them because they rob and kill innocent birds. 
So too with the blackbirds, I often have watched 
them fleeing from two or three little birds that 
they had robbed. It is idle to talk of saving the 
birds by ceasing to destroy crows and blackbirds. 
They are the very worst enemies that birds have. 
I am tired and out of patience with the almost 
eternal cry of “ Save the crows,” because, as the 
New-York farmers club says, they are terrible 
fellows to kill worms and save the corn. It is 
true that they will eat a few worms when they 
come handy and can get nothing else, but they 
greatly prefer larger game, and when they can 
find frogs, young chickens, or young birds of 
any kind, they never trouble themselves about 
the duty of picking worms out of corn hills ; 
one robin is worth a dozen crows to kill worms, 
and yet the crow-savers never seem to dream 
that the crow and blackbird will soon extermi¬ 
nate these useful, innocent birds, as well as many 
others. As to firing guns, I would say that I 
shot more than any other man in the neighbor¬ 
hood, and I have frequently heard persons re¬ 
mark that we have more singing birds than any 
of our neighbors. The report of a gun evident¬ 
ly does not frighten small birds away, else none 
would be with us. D. W. F. 
Seasonable Cultivation. 
There is such a thing as thorough culture, and 
seasonable culture; it is of the latter we now 
have a word to say. Seasonable culture cuts 
down and roots up weeds when they are quite 
small. It does not wait until they have become 
so large as to require double the amount of time 
and strength to subdue them. Least of all does 
it wait until they have ripened their seeds and 
begun to scatter them on the wind. Seasona¬ 
ble culture tills plants at the time they will be 
most benefitted by it. Here, for example, is a 
hill of melons: the vines a foot long, and the 
weeds among them a foot high. Now,.how long 
would those vines have become by this time, it 
the weeds had never been allowed to grow ? It 
will not make amends to cut them down now: 
they should never have been suffered to grow at 
all. Work vigorously as you may, the rest or 
the Summer, you can not catch up. Here, then, 
is a difference between culture and seasonable 
culture. Consider this, too. The work of dig¬ 
ging out such large weeds injures the melons. 
The roots will be more or less broken and dis¬ 
turbed, and the leaves, suddenly exposed to the 
full glare of the sun, will wither. When the 
plants recover from this shock, and go on again 
to set their fruit, it will be considerably later in 
maturing, than it would have been under better 
management; and of course it will be poorer 
than if ripened in its own proper season. Does 
not this instance illustrate a general principle ? 
The rule holds good of nearly all crops. ' They 
should be planted in their proper season, and 
cultivated at the time they most need it. Let far¬ 
mers learn, if they would thrive, to till no more 
ground than they can till vyell arid seasonably. 
