[ 105 ] 
admit a rope or chaiii to pass thro’ therri, by which 
they are fixed to the yoke, and each .pair of them 
are united by a ’ cliaia or rope under the oxen’s 
necks. You will see that the draft is in this case, 
by the top of the shoulders only, and I belie-ve is to 
be preferred to our bows on that account, because 
the bow by pressing the shoulder blade impedes 
the motion of the animal. You Will ask how they 
hold back, as with us the ox coming down hill, 
holds back only by turning his neck against the 
bow ? This is effected thro’ all the hilly country of 
Italy, whether they use yokes or draw by the horns, 
by a contrivance that might certainly be usefully 
adopted here. The end of the pole projects consid¬ 
erably beyond the heads of the cattle, and turns up 
very much ; to this is fixed a leather strap that goes 
round the horns of the oxen, so that they keep back 
the weight by their horiis ; the cart can not go for¬ 
ward without dragging the cattle. In this way^.^ 
they keep back with much more ease than ours do 
by twisting their necks. In the flat country as it is 
very seldom that they have to go down hill, they 
seem to trust to providence when they do, having 
made no provision for a case that seldom happens, 
at least that I saw, but they may have some re¬ 
source which I know not of : as I found in Hol¬ 
land, one which I should not have thought of (ifi 
driving their waggons as they do there without 
breech harness) had I not seen a man going down 
6ne of the dykes, his farm laying below it, with two 
sprightly horses. He kept his foot against thb 
