JULY as 
There is a common impression that a mare 
which has been once covered by a jack will 
never again produce a good horse colt, and 
that she should be kept for mulo-breeding ex¬ 
clusively; but there are not sufficient data to 
confirm this impression, though no doubt the 
influence of the male on the female is not al-‘ 
ways confined to the immediate progeny, be¬ 
ing sometimes transmitted to future offspring. 
As a rule, hybrid progeny are sterile; but ex¬ 
perience amply proves that the he mule can 
generate and that the she mule can produce,but 
there are no well authenticated examples of 
the continuance of the mule beyond one gener¬ 
ation. Such cases occur in Spain,Italy aud still 
more frequently in the West Indies and Aus¬ 
tralia; but mules never breed in cold climates, 
rarely in temperate countries, and, indeed, 
seldom even in warm regions. 
In breeding mules, the selection of the 
jack is of first importance. Since Washing¬ 
ton's time great improvements have been 
made in the domestic stock. In the early days 
of mule-breeding, frequent Importations were 
made of Spanish, Maltese and Moorish jacks 
and jennies, but. of late our home-raised ani¬ 
mals are considered as good as any we can im¬ 
port; hut, as in the case of Thoroughbred 
horses, occasional importations are still made. 
The best jacks can doubtless bo found in the 
sections where the most mules are raised, and 
the following comities in the great mule-rais¬ 
ing States produce the greatest numbers: 
Missouri — Lafayette, Salme and Johnson: 
Tennessee—Shelby, Wilson and Rutherford: 
Illinois—Madison and Christian; Kansas— 
Sumner and Atchison; Kentucky — Logan 
aud Madison; Virginia—Halifax and Pitt¬ 
sylvania. According to the purpose for which 
the offspring is intended, the jack should be 
from 14 to 10 bauds high, with a good length 
of body, deep chest, round barrel, heavy, fiat¬ 
boned limbs, a long, thin face, with fine, thin 
jaw-bones. His cars should be carried up¬ 
right, and should not be too thick, and he 
should have a sprightly temper aud appear¬ 
ance. The mares to be selected should have 
largo, roomy bodies on short, stroug legs. 
They should iiave good, sprightly tempers, aud 
a Thoroughbred cross is by no means au objec¬ 
tion. A horse should always he used to try if 
the mare is in season, because a mare will 
often allow a jack to serve her when, without 
such preparation, she would object to his 
approach. Mares should be bred to the jack 
early in spring, so the colls may be of sufficient 
age before winter begins. To insure good, 
thrifty colts, a jack should not be allowed to 
serve more than, say, 50 mares in a season of 
three mouths. He should have feed which 
will produce strength witnout feverishness, 
and, when practicable, natural exercise and 
freedom at grass should be allowed bun. Ani¬ 
mals designed for crossing on mares should 
not be permitted any intercourse with their 
own kind, as they often become worthless for 
cross-breeding when allowed contact with 
their own species. 
Castration is done by many breeders the 
first summer while the colts are still with their 
dams; but it is generally postponed till itaeani- 
nials are- nearly a year old, just before they 
are turned out to pasture the second year. It 
is performed in the same manner as with 
horses. It should bo done before the flies have 
become troublesome. The early education of 
mules and horses requires the same manage¬ 
ment—kindness, familiarity and firmness. 
The same gentle but resolute treatment that 
overcomes the suspicion and irritability of 
the horse, disarms the obduracy of the mule. 
The term “breaking” is a misnomer as applied 
to either, as it implies a destruction of spirit 
and energy, very valuable qualities. Both 
should be inured to labor so gradually that 
they hardly know when pastime ends and 
work begins. Among all domestic animals, 
however, mules are most remarkable for re¬ 
senting any injury; hence they are almost 
universally credited with vieiousnessand stub¬ 
bornness. With few exceptions they are born 
kickers. Kicking is their natural means of 
defence, and as soon as they can stand they 
are generally ready to resort to it by instinct, 
lu handling them at first this propensity must 
l>e guarded against. Whipping and harsh 
treatment invariably make a worse kieker. 
Just so long as anybody fights a young mule 
aud keeps him timid and afraid, SO long will 
he be in danger of a kick. The soouer the ani¬ 
mal is convinced by kindness that the attend¬ 
ant will not hurt him, the soouer is ended all 
danger from his hods. It is best to begin 
breaking for farm use when the animals are 
coming two years old, and by using for light 
work the third year, they will have a quicker 
step thau if not worked until they have at¬ 
tained maturity. 
The mule is everywhere hardier thaft the 
horse, matures considerably earlier, is subject 
to fewer diseases, is more sure-footed and there¬ 
fore better adapted to travel ng in a rugged 
trackless country, much less fastidious as to 
food, more muscular iu proportion to his 
THE RUBAI- HEW- 
weight, and is usually able to work twice as 
long. To Darwin the mule always appeared * 1 2 3 4 5 ‘a 
surprising creature.” “That a hybrid,” says 
he, “should possess more intelligence, memory, 
obstinacy, social affection and power of mus¬ 
cular endurance than either of its parents, 
seems to indicate that art has outoiastered 
nature.” A well-bred mule Is as spirited and 
equally active or even quicker than a horse. 
It walks fast aud pulls even more steadily. 
Cuvier says a jack has a much heavier brain 
than the best Thoroughbred horse, and mules 
are remarkably Intelligent., so that they can 
very readily be trained either to the line or to 
the word. Moreover, while a horse that has 
once run away is never safe afterward; a 
mule that has done so once rarely does so 
again; his nature does uot. incline him to such 
tricks. 
St. Louis is the greatest market in the coun¬ 
try for mules, and, the year round, one year 
with another, the prices for them average 
from 10 to &3 per cent higher than for work 
horses of all kinds. The sizes are 14 to 15 
hands, with an advance of about 10 per cent, 
for those 15 to 10 hands high, and an extra ad¬ 
vance for larger beasts. The supply comes 
maiuly from Western Missouri, Kansas, Iowa 
and Illinois, with smaller numbers from Indi¬ 
ana and other States, chiefly those along the 
Mississippi. The greater part, of the animals 
are shipped “down South,” In selecting 
stock, mules of a cream color are to lie avoid¬ 
ed, as they are apt to be soft; they lack 
strength and can stand but little hardship, 
particularly those that have white skins iron- 
grays are considered hardy. Spotted and 
dappled mules are regarded as the poorest of 
all. They cannot stand hard work, and when 
once diseased and they begin to lose strength, 
it's hard to save them. Then, again, they 
generally have bad eyes, and in the heat aud 
dust of summer they are likely to go blind. 
Snow-white mules are thought about as use¬ 
less. In selecting mules, one should look to 
the age, bight, size of bone, muscle, and 
disposition. Female mules are safer under 
the saddle, and better thau male mules for 
team pair poses. 
STOCK NOTES. 
Objections to Jerseys. —In the corn and 
cattle counties of the prairie States, the Jer- 
seys are certainly losing ground and are com¬ 
ing to lie, if uot unpopular, unprofitable. Un¬ 
less registered, a Jersey bull calf is of no 
pecuniary account, nor is a heifer, unless she 
comes of a deep-milking dam, and both are 
commonly knocked on the head as soon as 
dropped. If suckled and fed till four to six 
weeks old. butchers will not pay half of what 
they will for a calf of the same age of the 
beef breeds, and farmers and feeders will not 
have them at any price. A grade Short-horn 
or White-face calf, full-fed, when four to six 
weeks old will sell to the butcher for five to 
six cents a pound, live weight, and these are 
figures feeders pay if they get them. When 
past, milking age, a Jersey cow is put into con¬ 
dition for the butcher at twice the cost of a 
grade Short-bom, and when she gets there she 
brings only about two-thirds of the money. 
Except for milk, the Jersey amounts to 
little or nothing, and since, where gross, bay, 
forage aud grain are abundaut aud rela¬ 
tively' cheap, half the profits from a milch 
cow should come from the butcher’s block, 
she cannot long remain popular after, when 
compared with the beet" breeds, it is sbowu 
she is unprofitable. 
Anthrax. —It. is coming to be understood 
that the black-leg or anthrax among cattle, is 
in a large measure due to the insufficient 
albuminous ami phosphate elements in the 
food, resulting in a weakening of the constitu¬ 
tional strength and vigor; and therefore no 
sort of treatment., medical or otherwise, that 
does not. aim to restore exhausted energies, 
has amounted or ever will amount to any¬ 
thing When it appears in a herd, the pro¬ 
gress of the disease is best arrested by a com¬ 
plete change of food, and to foot! of a 
nutritious and highly albuminous character, 
represented by a mixture of equal parts of 
ground outs and wheat, bran, Good, high and 
dry laud grass, pure water aud a tonic put 
within reach and will of the beasts to get at, 
consisting of a mixture of oquul parts of 
hard-wood ashes, common salt and powdered 
calcined bone, should be freely furnished. 
Dry Murrain. —In summer, when droughts 
prevail over extensive areas of country, there 
are great, losses among stock from dry mur¬ 
rain—or the impaction of undigested food iu 
the manifold or third stomach. The best 
remedy is found to be a strong cathartic, con¬ 
sisting of tw’o pounds of Epsom salts dissolved 
in two quarts of warm water and administered 
as a drench. The disease is more common on 
thin soils where the grasses are poor, than on 
rich where they are y'oung aud nutritious; on 
wild grass than on tame; in dry and hot sum¬ 
mers, than in cool and wet ones; and in the 
South rather than in the North, and may be 
prevented in any case, by providing nutritious 
food in the first place aud abundant water. 
In fact, the disease owes its origin in most 
cases, to on insufficient water supply, or to 
water of so foul a character,that cattle will not 
drink enough of it to promote healthy digest¬ 
ion, B. F. JOHNSON. 
Champaign Co., Ills. 
Pain) ijusbamJn). 
HINTS TO CHEESE-MAKERS. 
T. D. CURTIS. 
This is the season when witches get iuto the 
cheese-vat. There are many sources through 
which they may enter. 
1. The cows may be kept in scant pastures 
without shade, the broiling sun pouring down 
upon their unprotected backs from morning 
until night. This is annoying and injurious 
to health, causing a feverish condition of the 
system which is communicated to the nulk 
and aids in the development of floating curds. 
The good dairyman provides his cows with an 
abundance of shade and sees to it that they do 
not have to labor all day in a dried-up pas¬ 
ture to get a scant supply of food, but have a 
sufficiency to eat and time to lie down in cool 
places, chew the cud, dreatu aud secrete good, 
wholesome milk. 
2. Cows are too often compelled to get their 
supply of water from stagnant ponds and 
pools. These are teeming with animal and 
vegetable forms of life, of u microscopic char¬ 
acter, which are taken into the stomach and 
enter into the circulatory system. Experi¬ 
ments made at Cornell University, some years 
ago, showed that these minute organisms and 
spores not only go into the blood, where they 
are found, but into the milk which is elabor¬ 
ated from the blood, rendering it unfit for hu¬ 
man food. Such milk will play the very mis¬ 
chief in the cheese-vat, turning out cheeses 
that when cured are known as “stinkers.” 
Pure water and plenty of it, are absolutely es¬ 
sential to the production of sound milk. 
3. At this season of the year the air is full 
of all sorts of microscopic life, the germs of 
which are floating aud settling everywhere. 
They are most plentiful iu stables, barnyards, 
sheds, etc., and wherever there is fermenting 
and decaying matter. If the cows are milked 
tn such a place these microbes will l>e inhaled 
by the cows and enter into the general circula¬ 
tion and thence into the milk, and they will 
also fall into the milk-pails and cans, aud con¬ 
taminate milk by direct contact. It is de¬ 
clared by good authority that if the cows 
breathe a foul atmosphere for 15 minutes the 
foulness will show in the flavor of the milk 
and injure its keepiug qualities. These mi¬ 
crobes may not at once show in the cheese- 
vat, but they will develop sooner or later, and 
their effects will be seen in the cheeses on the 
ranges. Therefore, all places aud their viciu- 
ities where cows are milked cannot lie kept 
too clean nor be too thoroughly deodorized. 
4. The milk may lie injured by improper 
haudling. It may not be properly cooled at 
night, and, therefore, taint or sour. It may 
be too closely confined in the cans while hot, 
and in this wuy become tainted. It may be 
carried to the factory iu cans not properly 
ventilated and be exposed for a long time on 
the road to the hot rays of the sun, which will 
develop taint. The hot milk of the morning's 
milking may lie poured into the cold night’s 
milk, thus hastening the decomposition of the 
latter by raising the temperature,and through 
this tainting aud souring the whole batch. 
Care should he taken to keep the night’s and 
morning’s milk separate, ituless the latter is 
thoroughly cooled before the two arc mixed. 
The other causes of early taint and decompo¬ 
sition should, of course, be avoided and 
guarded aguinst. 
5. Ferments and taints may collect in the 
sharp corners and crevices of the vats and im¬ 
plements used in the cheese factory. The 
strainers and conductors may not lie properly 
washed aud scalded, the thermometer even 
may become louded with injurious germs, 
and so of everything that comes in contact 
with the milk or curd, uot forgettiug every 
faucet. The rennet preparation may get 
tainted and unfit to use if not kept, in a cool 
place. The floors may become sources of 
mischief, and ought to he kept scrupulously 
clean. All sink-holes and pools around the 
factory, all spouts aud places where whey 
may spill aud become corrupt, should bo 
watched aud carefully cleansed. The invisi¬ 
ble forces are active, aud will put in their 
work wherever they can get a chance. Be on 
your guard against their insidious entry. 
6 After all is said and done, if your curing 
room is not right, the witches may play the 
mischief with you there. The best, of curds 
may be spoiled by the worst of curing-rooms 
—one in which the temperature rises and falls 
with the changes outside. The curing-room 
should be so constructed as to be under per¬ 
fect control of teraperature.and be kept at not 
higher than 70 degrees or lower than 05. But 
very few curing rooms are of this character, 
and this accounts for a large share of the poor 
or indifferent cheese thrown upon the market, 
while entailing heavy losses upon all whose 
income depends upon the receipts of the fac¬ 
tory. A)l curing-rooms should have double 
walls, with two or three, or more, dead-air 
spaces and double windows and properly con¬ 
structed ventilators In the absence of these 
essentials, the best that the cheese-worker can 
do is to open his windows at night, lettiug in 
the cool air, and carefully keep them 
closed through the heat of the day. The im¬ 
portance of curing-rooms so constructed that 
the temperature iu them cau be properly con- 
t-roled is not yet understood by the great raa- 
jority of dairymen. Close attention to this is 
one of the desiderata of the day. 
I killed a hog last December, which, at l!) 
mouths and 20 days, weighed 603 pounds net. 
He was a Berkshire boar which came from 
Ohio. I fed him equal parts of corn meal and 
wheat bran — just enough to give him good 
growth, not enough to fatten—till he was Hi 
months old. Then he seemed too coarse for a 
breeder, so I castrated him, and as soon as lie 
was well, began to fatten him. 1 gave him 
the same feed as before, and gradually in¬ 
creased the meal until, during the last six 
weeks, I fed oue-fourth bran and three-fourths 
meal. I now use a Poland-Cbina boar. 
Crossed on grade Berkshire sows, 1 get the best 
hog for this country. At one year old, they 
often weigh 400 pounds or over. According 
to my idea, hogs pay only when one has a 
first-class breed, and gives them proper atten¬ 
tion I would give all ground feed, and push 
them from the beginning up to about one 3 'ear, 
and then kuife them. Like corn, they must 
grow' all the time, till ripe. I always keep one 
feed wet up ahead. j.i . c. 
Marietta. Ga. 
The following law governs the sale of poul¬ 
try iu the Massachusetts markets: 
Section 1. No poultry, except it be alive, 
shall be sold or exposed for sale until it has 
been properly dressed, by the removal of (lie 
entire head, entrails and feathers, and the 
crop when containing any food or other sub¬ 
stance. 
Sec. 2. Whoever sells or exposes for sale 
poultry contrary to the provisions of section 
one of this act shull be punished by a lino of 
#5 for each bird sold or exposed for sale The 
Board of Health in tin* several eitie.s aud towns 
shall cause the provisions of this act to be en¬ 
forced in their respective cities and towns. 
Sec. 3. This act shall not apply to green 
geese or green ducks at any season of the year, 
nor to broiler chickens weighing two pounds 
or less, with crops shrunken to t he body, dur¬ 
ing the months of July, August and Septem¬ 
ber. 
For the Philadelphia market all fowls 
should be undrawn, with heads and feet at¬ 
tached. That is, they should be entire, except 
that the feathers should l>o removed. It is 
simply a custom, as no special laws regulate 
the manner of selling. They should be dry- 
picked. 
Definitions.— The poultry judges at the 
Nebraska State Fair unike this announce¬ 
ment: 
The terms “fowl,” “chick,” eta, are thus 
defined: Fowl—a bird hatched prior to 1SS7; 
(.'hick—a bird hatched during 18s7; Cock—a 
male bird hatched prior to 1887; Cockerel—a 
male bird hatched during l s '87; Hen—a female 
bird hatched prior to 1887; Pullet—a female 
bird hatched during 1887. 
A DAIRY BARN. 
WALDO K. BROWN. 
The essentials of every good stock or dairy 
stable are: that it should lie warm and dry; 
that the floors and nmuure ditches be so ar¬ 
ranged that the cows can be kept clean, and 
the milker cau pass iu aud out without walk- 
