yfURE 
■SEISult 
' "AG RlCULTURf- 
1 WHOLE NO. 765 
ROCHESTER, N. Y.-FOR THE WEEK ENDING SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 10,1864 
That they were taken from a single family is 
inferable from different facts. First. Ilis im¬ 
ported flock had that sameness in appearance 
and character which indicates sameness of 
blood. It is conceded on all sides that they 
“were as like as peas in a peek.” Second. 
They spontaneously and without weeding out, 
transmitted this sameness both to their immedi¬ 
ate and later descendants—a thing they could 
not possibly have done had they, Hke the French 
Merinos, been drawn from different cabanas, 
and consequently possessed different hereditary 
characteristics. Here we might rent, assuming 
the fact under consideration to be conclusively 
proven, in the absence of positive counterbal¬ 
ancing testimony — and none such has ever been 
adduced. But there is a third reason which 
would alone render the fact next to moraUy 
certain. Col. Humphreys himself declares 
that his sheep were selected for him by a re¬ 
spectable Spaniard. On what grounds did he 
make choice of this Spanish agent? Undoubt¬ 
edly because he was recommended to him ^ 
persons in whose knowledge of the subject and 
integrity Col. Humphreys had Ml confidence. 
The latter was the .American Ambassador re¬ 
siding at the Spanish Capital. His elegant and 
ceremonious manners, his varied accomplish¬ 
ments as a soldier, a poet, a wit and man of the 
world, and his fondness for Spanish society, ren¬ 
dered him, more than is commonly the case with 
Ambassadors, a favorke at the Spanish Court. 
Those great grandees who owned the principal 
flocks of Spain, also resided at the Capital, and 
numbers of them iflust have been known per¬ 
sonally by Colonel Humphreys. In seeking 
information in regard to Spanish flocks, he 
would naturally apply to such men, and proba¬ 
bly would be supplied by them with informa¬ 
tion derived from their Mayors Is, or head 
Shepherds. 
Every Spaniard of that day who had any 
connection with sheep, considered it wholly 
improper to mix the different great families or 
cabanas. It was contrary to the settled tradi¬ 
tions of the country. 
ments and experience do not sustain him in it. 
These facts cannot be thrust aside by any mere 
scientific theory. Potatoes have been too long 
and too generally u>ed as an article of food—as 
a standard element of jonsumption—to warrant 
any such conclusion. 
But it is not recommended that potatoes shall 
become un exclusive diet for horses, nor for 
humans. Lkibig bases his opinion of its value 
upon the amount of nitrogen found in it. But 
if the amount of nitrogen he small, then we 
must conclude that other nutritive elements 
enter largely into its composition. Loudon 
estimates that an acre of potatoes will yield 
more than double (five-ninths more) the quantity 
of nutritious food that an acre of wheat will 
yield—not as much in proportion to bulk, but 
more per acre. Curwk.y ltd his horses each a 
stone and a half (21 lbs.) of steamed potatoes 
mixed with a tenth of cut straw daily, and he 
found an acre of potatoes prepared in this way, 
“ to go as far as four acre- of hay.” Other ex¬ 
periments have established the fact that the 
potato, and meadow hay, when brought to the 
same state of dryness, contain as nearly as possi¬ 
ble the same proportions of azote—the vital 
part of food; and the balance of the potato 
is nearly all -rarch, and available as food, while 
the remainder of the hay is largely woody fiber, 
and unavaiUable for food. 
BoussinGAULT's experiments and analyses 
with a view to determine the relative values of 
different kinds of food of animals, are probably 
as complete as any. His table of equivalents 
are interesting. Taking ten pounds of hay as 
the standard, he gives t**e following quantities 
of different kinds of foodie equivalents:—clover 
hay, cut in flower, 10 lb-.; green clover in flow¬ 
er. 34; wheat straw. 52; rye straw, 61; baney 
straw, 52; oat straw, 55; pea straw, 6; potato 
leaves, 36; carrot leaves, 13; potatoes. 28; old 
potatoes, 41; carrots, 35; turnips, 61; white 
cabbage, 37; peas, 3; indian com, 6; wheat, 5; 
rye, 5; barley, 6; oats, 5; bran, 0; oil-cake, 2. 
The foregoing figures, based as they are, not 
alone on analyses, but upon actual feeding ex¬ 
periments, afford as accurate and reliable data 
for comparison as we have, probably. But we 
need not go to Boussingault for proof of the 
nutritious character of the potato <u> a food f ir 
animals. Every farmer who lots fattened his 
hogs on boiled potatoes— as many have, or at 
least kept them in excellent thrift—knows that 
Liebig’s theory’ is a false one—at. any rate it is 
not broad enough to cover the facts. 
Potatoes should not be fed to stock, in quanti¬ 
ty. uncooked. It is more profitable to steam 
them. True, men who have tested them, say 
they are excellent fed to milch cows, cut and 
uncooked. But steamed, they are better for 
both cows and horses. If you have no steam 
apparatus —as every farmer who feeds stock 
should have—it is better to boil them than to 
feed them raw. 
There is one other item which should not be 
overlooked if it be true, as Vox Tiiaer asserts, 
that potatoes when given to live stock, produce 
moi’e manure than any other food—100 pounds 
of potatoes producing 66 pounds of manure of 
the very best description. 
We wish our readers to take notice that while 
we do regard the potato valuable as a food for 
stock, we do not assert that it is more profitable 
to teed it to horses than hay and oats, or to cows, 
than hay and shorts, or carrots or turnips. This 
question of comparative profit must depend al¬ 
ways on the comparative market value of the 
different articles of consumption, and upon the 
relative cost of production. 
The intelligent f irmer who does business with 
his capital invested in his farm, its stock, crops 
and implements, just as he would do business 
with the same amount of capital invested in 
sugars, teas and sirups, ov any other article of 
merchandise, can approach this subject of rela¬ 
tive profit very nearly, aided by his knowledge 
of the cost of the product, its market value, 
present and prospective, and the above statement 
of equivalents by Boudin Gault. And the 
farmer who has not provided himself with such 
data, would not be likely to profit by any aid we 
might attempt to render him. 
MOOEE’S EUEAL NEW-YORKER, 
AN ORIGINAI. WEEKLY 
RURAL, LITERARY AND FAMILY NEWSPAPER. 
CONDUCTED BY D, D. T. MOORE. 
CIIAKLES I>. HIIACnON, A#«oilute Editor. 
TO CORRESPONDENTS. — Mr. RANDALL’S address Is 
Cortland Village, Cortland Co., N. Y. AU communica¬ 
tions Intended for Uiis Department, and aU Inquiries 
relating to sheep, should he addressed to him as above. 
HENRY 3. RANDALL. LL. D„ 
Edltor Department of Bheop Husbandry. 
SPECIAL CONTRIBUTORS! 
SHEEP WORK FOR SEPTEMBER. 
C. DEWEY, LL. P., 
L. B. LANGWORTHY. 
P. BARRY, 
H. T. BROOKS, 
The Rural New-Yorker is designed to be unsur¬ 
passed In Value, Purity, and Variety of Contents, and 
unique and beautiful In Appearance. Its Conductor 
devotes Uls personal attentlou to the supervision of its 
various departments, and earnestly labors to render 
the RURAL au eminently Reliable Guide on all the 
Important Practical, BclentlOc and other Subjects Inti¬ 
mately connected with the business of those whose 
Interests it sealonsly advocates. As a Family Journal 
it Is eminently Instructive and Entertaining — Ndng 9o 
conducted that it can be safely taken to the Humes of 
people of lutrJljgencc, taste and discrimination. It 
embraces more Agrluultural, Horticultural, Scientific, 
Educational, Literary and News Matter.Interspersed 
with appropriate Engravings, than any other journal, — 
rendering it Die most complete Agricultural Lite¬ 
rary and Family Newspaper In America. 
it whatever. Ami even gardeners near large 
towns, make no effort whatever to avail them¬ 
selves of this source of wealth to them, if it were 
only employed. In some cities It passes into 
the sewers, and thence into streams or the sea. 
In other cities the vaults receive it, and periodi¬ 
cally it is carted thence outside, and buried in 
pits. In most cases, whether washed away in 
the sewers, or allowed to remain in the vaults, 
it is not only an economic Jess, but :m actual 
source of disease. For there are very fe w vaults 
that receive disinfectants or deodorizers, and 
the sewers usually concentrate into some stream 
from which poisonous malaria settles over the 
city drained, if indeed it is not actually returned 
in a diluted form, through the hydrants, to the 
people for drinking and cooking purposes, as we 
happen to know is the case in some large cities 
in this country. And the privy vaults of the 
farmer, who of all men ought to utilize this 
element of productiveness, very rarely receive 
attention. The vaults are scarce ever cleaned 
out, and much more rarely is it the case that 
any deodorizer or absorbent is thrown into 
them. From year to year they emit poison re¬ 
sulting from fermentation. 
Our bodies consume food in a way similar to 
that in which the same substances would be 
consumed if burned in an open fire. Through 
the skin and by means of the lungs, the carbon 
and hydrogen of food are expelled in the final 
form of carbonic acid and water. The nitrogen 
is collected In the form of urea, which, united 
with water, is converted into carbonate of am¬ 
monia; and the fceces containing the unburned 
substances of the food—the mineral constituents, 
undigested food and nitrogenous matters that 
have escaped from the digestive organs. The 
urine contains the soluble mineral substances 
of the food, together with the nitrogen in the 
form of urea, and compounds of ammonia. Ex¬ 
periments and analyses have established the 
fact that the inorganic portions of the food of 
animals are again obtained in their solid and 
liquid excrements. This being so, some idea 
may be formed of the Value of the manure 
wasted, by making an estimate of the quantity 
of food the vast population of our country con¬ 
sumes annually, Not only is that portion con¬ 
sumed by us largely lost by waste, but that 
portion exported is absolutely lost. Hence, 
knowing tlie amount of grain produced, it will 
enable the reader to form some estimate of the 
loss. Hence, too, the importance of husbanding 
and Using that portion which is not exported 
from the country. 
We shall continue this subject. 
WASTED WEALTH, 
Plants require food. It is essential to their 
grow’th and fructification. This food must be 
adapted to the nature, habits and wants of the 
plant. The soil is constantly giving to us its 
wealth. Tribute is levied upon the air to build 
up these wondeiful vegetable structures—these 
miracles of growth, called plants, which are 
perfected only by the perfection of the germ in 
the seed, -which is a type of the spirit that is in 
us, in that it is forever reproductive—the decay 
of the seed ending in the development of a new 
life. 
The supply of this food adapted to the wants 
of this vegetable life is as exhaustless as nature. 
And the God of Nature, by a wonderful system 
of rotation, supplies to each vegetable structure, 
as He planted it, food adapted to its wants. But 
with the agency of man in seeding the soil and 
in its cultivation, comes the necessity lor the 
employment of his agency iu supplying the 
plants cultivated with the kind of food they re¬ 
quire. God worlta through agents. Compen¬ 
sation is one of lire laws. Farmers recognize 
this law’when they cart out the manure from 
the farm-yard to the field—when they pay hack 
to the soil a portion of what they take from it. 
Then it is important the conditions of the 
growth of plants should never be lost sight of. 
The natures of plants should be studied, their 
wants discovered ami supplied. It seems to us 
there Is nowhere a more complex and difficult 
profession than that of the agriculturist, if he 
lacks a knowledge of the laws of vegetable life. 
And it is wonderfully simple and plain, as well 
as pleasant and profitable, if he acquires some 
knowledge of these laws, and labora on his farm 
Col. Humphreys had 
then had little or no personal experience with 
sheep, and it was natural that he hould adopt 
without question the views of the people whom 
he bought of. If he had entertained different 
views aDd entertained them so fixedly that he 
required his agent to act on them and to select 
sheep for him from different cabanas, it would 
have been in the expectation, of deriving some 
benefit from the crop. And the same motives 
which induced him, under 3uch expectations, to 
strike out a new path, would also have induced 
him to declare the fact to his countrymen in 
order to call their attention to his anticipated 
improvement. We have examined his pub¬ 
lished works, and a number of his unpublished 
letters in regard to his sheep. We now’here 
find a hint that he started with sheep of differ¬ 
ent cabanas—that he entertained the remotest 
idea of improving or changing the Spanish 
sheep, or of cutting clear from the Spanish ideas 
of breeding them. 
We have remarked on a former occasion that 
from a variety of hints and facts in our posses¬ 
sion, we believe Col. Humpiuvrys’ sheep were 
drawn from the Infantado cabaua. And we 
have never discovered anything whi»u tended 
to an opposite conclusion. We regard the fact 
as of no consequence whatever, in itself con¬ 
sidered. That name implies no especial excel¬ 
lence or superiority of descent. There were half 
a dozen, perhaps a dozen, other Spanish cabauas 
which stood just as high in reputatiou as that of 
the Duke of Infantado, when Col. Humphreys* 
importations, and the later importations of Mr. 
Jarvis, were made. The pure descendants of the 
Humphreys’ sheep now in the United States 
derive no prestige, or increased market value, 
from that name. We made use of it iu the Frac- 
tical Shepherd, because, 1, we beUeved it to be 
the true name, and 2, because we know of no 
other appropriate name. To call them Hum¬ 
phreys’ Merinos, seemed to carry back the mind 
to the sheep of his day—to the unimproved Span¬ 
ish Merino. To call them Atwood sheep, seemed 
to carry back the mind half way to that period: 
and what would be the justice of giving them 
the name of a person who had neither been the 
importer nor the greatest improver of them? 
To call them Hammond sheep, seemed too much 
to ignore the great services rendered to the pub¬ 
lic, in respect to them, by Col. Humphreys 
and Mr. At WOOD. 
We never sought to force the name on others, 
and cared not a straw whether they adopted i|^ 
or not It has, however, been pretty generally 
MERINO PEDIGREES. 
We have, within a few months, received 
letters from three or four persons who appear 
to be hopelessly mystified on the subject of 
Merino Pedigrees. They can not understand 
them, aud especially they can not understand 
the genealogy of the American Paulars, Infan- 
tudos, etc. If these gentlemen had informed 
us precisely in what their difficulties consisted, 
we should have some hope of being able to 
explain them away. As it is, we can only 
reply generally, until their perplexities are 
more definitely stated. 
We suppose that all these anxious inquirers 
understand that at the beginning of this century 
there existed, and had then existed for ages, in 
Spain, a pure breed of sheep called Merinos: 
that this breed was divided into families which 
were preserved as distinct from each other, as 
was the breed itself from other breeds. Some 
of these families were imported into the United 
States by such men as Col. HUMPHREYS and 
Hon. William Jarvis. We are not aware 
that Col. Humphreys ever distinctly stated 
from what Spanish family his sheep were taken. 
POTATOES AS FOOD FOR STOCK 
The state, County and Local Fairs are 
coming on apace, and all who wish to he repre¬ 
sented, either personally or by exl ibiting the 
products of their skill aud labor, should give the 
matter of preparation early attention. Though 
at war with the rebels, and bound to conquer 
them, let us show that the Peaceful Arts are not 
on the wane in any section of the Loyal States. 
