SMALL VS. LARGE CALVES. 
339 
SMALL vs. LARGE CALVES; 
In my article in the September number of the 
Agriculturist,entitled “Large vs. Small Calves, &c.,” 
I did not expect two opponents—our worthy editor 
and his Reviewer; but when I am bound for a con¬ 
troversy the more the better. It will bring out 
something in the end that will benefit some of us. 
The editor may advocate the shorthorns, but 
Reviewer seems to say he is a little “Herefordish ;” 
therefore, he will be more disposed to enter on the 
subject of “ Large and small calves.” I am per¬ 
suaded it is one of much importance to those breed¬ 
ers who have not turned their attention to it. 
I did not say, in my article, that shorthorn cows 
produced “large calves;” but if the editor will 
have it so, the “same cap may fit” on other breeders 
of them. I shall leave it to practical breeders to 
prove my assertion, that mongrel females, from 
mongrel sires, invariably produce “ large calves,” 
unless too much impoverished to do so ; then, they 
are nearly all head and legs. In such a case, 
“ third-class” would be too high for them. I know 
some shorthorn cows that have produced small 
calves, and I will venture to say, that all those 
“ crack animals” exhibited for public inspection, 
were small the first day they were dropped. I am 
willing to leave this to shorthorn men. 1 did not 
intend, by my language, to convey this evil to 
shorthorns; but as my worthy friend, the editor 
claims it, I am bound to believe it is so, and I will 
advance my opinion in another way (a). I am per¬ 
fectly willing to admit I have seen beautiful short¬ 
horns, excellent milkers, possessing symmetry, 
weight, and quality, but there are thirty mongrels, 
with high pedigrees, to one prime beast; and this 
uncertainty condemns them as a breed. I have seen 
cows, heifers, and calves, in high condition, with 
ragged, narrow hips, uneven chines, thick necks, 
large, coarse shoulders, hollow crops, and a paunch 
with sufficient dimensions for two such animals, 
heavy, coarse buttocks and thighs, loaded with 
black, flabby flesh, down to the hocks. Some of 
them had only three teats, others two, and few 
with good, sound, well-made udders, with bones 
nearly large enough to support a dray horse, and 
hides as tight as if prepared for the drummer. On 
the other hand, I have seen bulls, at our state fairs, 
take first premiums, with pedigrees of sires, dams, 
and grandams, “as long as your arm.” “Crack 
stock,” too, with all the above objections. Proba¬ 
bly, Mr. Editor, when you reflect on this statement, 
you will find them to be facts too stubborn to be 
controverted (6). 
It may appear warlike to express my mind thus 
candidly, but 1 do not “surrender” before facts 
prove to the contrary. Wm. H. Sotham. 
^ Black Rock , N. Y., Sept., 1849. 
P (a) If our correspondent infers, from anything 
we have written, that we meant to convey the idea 
that any well-bred shorthorn ever threw a large 
calf, he misunderstood us. Their calves are always 
small, because their bones are fine. No well-bred 
animals ever have large, coarse bones. 
(6) Mr. S. cannot have a greater contempt for 
the worthless pedigrees of many an animal that is 
recorded in the Herd Book, than we have. It is 
these worthless grade brutes, installed there by the 
cupidity of their breeders, as pure shorthorns, 
which have done the breed so much discredit. 
There are but a few families of shorthorns which 
should have ever been recorded there; all the res! 
ought to have been rejected as grades. But the 
mischief is done and past recall. The only remedy 
now is, for breeders to inform themselves which 
these good families are, and then breed from their 
descendants as purely as possible. The Herd 
Book is little understood or cared for yet, in this 
country. It is therefore only a waste of words for 
us to dwell longer on this subject. 
ANIMAL FOOD FOR HERBIVOROUS ANIMALS— 
BONE MEAL FOR COWS. 
The ox, or bovine tribe, although decidedly her¬ 
bivorous, in some countries is fed, during a part of 
the year, at least, on a proportion of animal food. 
In Norway for instance, the herds and flocks are 
driven to the mountains in summer, and are there 
depastured ; but during the long winter, they are 
housed and partially fed on hay, and more plenti¬ 
fully on a thick, gelatinous soup, made by boiling 
horse dung with the heads of fish. 
A writer, in the “ Edinburgh Journal of Natural 
History,” says: “We are assured, by M. Yvart, 
that, in Auvergne, fat soups are given to cattle, 
especially when sick or enfeebled, for the purpose 
of invigorating them. The same practice is ob¬ 
served in some parts of North America, where the 
country people mix, in winter, fat broth with the 
vegetables given to their cattle, in order to render 
them more capable of resisting the severity of the 
weather. These broths have long been considered 
efficacious by veterinary practitioners of our own 
country, in restoring horses which have been 
enfeebled through long illness. It is said by Peall 
to be a common practice, in some parts of India, 
to mix animal substances with the grain given to 
feeble horses, and to boil the mixture into a sort of 
paste, which soon brings them into good condition, 
and restores their vigor. Pallas tells us, that the 
Russian boors make use of the dried flesh of the 
hamster, (a species of rat, common in some parts 
of Europe and Asia, having two cheek ponches for 
holding grain,) reduced to powder, and mixed with 
oats, and that this occasions their horses to acquire 
a sudden and extraordinary degree of embonpoint. 
Anderson relates, in his ‘ History of Ireland,’ that 
the inhabitants feed their horses with dried fish, 
when the cold is intense, and that these animals 
are extremely vigorous, though small. We also 
know, that in the Feroe Islands, the Orkneys, and 
in Norway, where the climate is still very cold, this 
practice is also adopted ; and it is not uncommon, 
in some very warm countries, as in the kingdom of 
Muskat, in Arabia Felix, near the straits of Ormuz, 
one of the most fertile parts of Arabia, fish and 
other animal substances are there given to the 
horses, in the cold season, as well as in times of 
scarcity.” 
Other herbivorous animals, also, occasionally par¬ 
take of animal food, to which they are doubtless 
led by instinct, as to a stimulus required by the 
system, for the maintenance of a due degree of 
energy. In Lapland, for instance, the reindeer 
devours the lemming, a little animal allied to the 
field mouse. The American reindeers are also accus- 
