52 
REMARKS ON THE CATTLE SHOW. 
vidual animals, the production of the same breeders, year after 
year. In short, what was intended to produce a national benefit 
has degenerated into a competition amongst individuals. 
To attain this one point of early obesity no pains have been 
spared, no expense grudged: the laws of nature have been set at 
defiance; breeding in-and-in has been resorted to, until at length 
the inevitable consequences are too glaring to be longer concealed: 
they meet the eye on every hand; and those varieties which 
have been the most fashionable, to wit, the Short-horns and 
Durhams, i. e. of the noted breeders of peculiar stocks, shew this 
the most, while those which have been less thought of present an 
unmistakeable superiority. 
Compare the two first varieties with the Devons;—how marked 
their difference! The sheep, again, shew the same thing; but, 
from a necessity that could not be concealed, the marked distinc¬ 
tion of varieties has greatly given way. It is now hard to dis¬ 
tinguish one variety of short wool from another: the same as 
regards the long wools; hence, by this interchange with non¬ 
cognate animals, less deterioration is manifest. 
In looking through the animals in Smithfield market, we see 
less fat, but more symmetry—less beauty, but more usefulness—• 
less high breeding, but more perfectness of animal development. 
As the deformed or imperfect are carefully excluded from the one 
and sent to the other, so must allowance be made for this in the 
estimate of shape and make: but, looking at the question as a 
whole, the market far, very far, exceeds in value and usefulness 
the show. 
Has it not occurred to the reflecting, that something better than 
mere fat was to be obtained by careful attention to breeding? 
That it has, is partly shewn by the new regulations for the judges 
by the Smithfield Club this year,—that fatness was not to be a 
criterion; but a reference to the Show proves that this was not 
always the rule. 
The points of failure are many, and could be easily singled out; 
but one seems so glaring, that it is surprising it has so long been 
allowed to prevail,—unwieldy size. Two great ends are retarded 
by this; first, that a large variety does not so soon attain maturity, 
and requires more room, and consumes a greater quantity of food 
