52 
THE CULTIYATOE. 
Feb. 
fields. The nominal value of that bane or blessing 
of man, as it happened to be in a liquid or solid 
state, varied from ten to six cents per bushel. At 
his juncture Mr. Renick determined to make an 
experiment, which his friends and relations deem¬ 
ed little better than burning his corn in the field. 
Unmoved, however, by their doubts, he fed a 
lot of cattle, and started them on an untried road, 
to a market beyond the mountains. How long it 
would take, or how they were to be fed on the 
way, or in what condition they would reach their 
destination, no man knew. As the first fifty cat¬ 
tle ever fed on the Scioto, or in the great valley of 
the Mississippi, were turned out of their pas¬ 
ture, one of his commisserating friends shook his 
head, and said, “ There goes poor George's forlorn 
hope.” Forlorn hope it w T as, but a glorious victo¬ 
ry perched upon its banner. The undertaking 
seemed desperate, but was eminently successful. 
To make his triumph the more complete, his trial 
was the more severe. When they reached Balti¬ 
more, he was no longer surrounded by friends who 
spoke their fears in whispers. To the inexperien¬ 
ced eye, the cattle were sore, hollow and poor. 
No one would buy. The butchers scouted his of¬ 
fers to sell, even at reduced prices. 
With that patient and quiet courage which has 
ever marked the man, Mr. Renick ordered two or 
three of the most indifferent of the cattle to be 
slaughtered, at his own expense, and the butcher 
was directed to give the meat to his customers, if 
he could not sell it, at his stall. A fact was made 
known, and a valuable lesson was taught to the 
butcher and consumer. That meat was “ the best 
for its looks they ever saw.” The lot was sold; 
another and another followed. Now, all is plain 
and easy. “Any one could have done that.” 
So thought and said thousands who have followed 
Columbus to the New World. Nor was there any 
mystery in making the egg stand up, after the 
great discoverer had showed them how to crush 
the end. The “forlorn hope” was the pioneer band 
to hundreds of thousands of fat cattle, which have 
gone from the Great West to the markets of Bal¬ 
timore, Philadelphia, New-York and Boston, and 
to be shipped from their ports to the far distant 
isles of the ocean. It has been computed, that 
not less than twenty thousand fat cattle, per an¬ 
num, cross the Scioto river, between the town of 
Piketon and the mouth of Darby. North and 
south of those points, the numbers, eastward 
bound, have not been included in the reckoning. 
Has not Mr. Renick opened a mice of wealth to 
the feeders and farmers of the whole western world, 
and at the same time secured to our eastern breth¬ 
ren a constant supply of a great necessary of life? 
This was not the only useful and striking exam¬ 
ple of that amiable and virtuous citizen. About 
thirty years after he had shown his brother farm¬ 
ers how to get their corn to market, after he had 
practically demonstrated that thousands of cattle, 
and countless thousands of hogs, could be fattened 
and driven where there was the greatest demand 
for them, he presented to the agricultural society 
of this county a certificate, signed by gentlemen 
of the highest character for veracity, that he had 
produced 154 \ bush, of corn on an acre of ground. 
I know that this achievment has been since equal¬ 
led and surpassed, but I mention it here, be- 
cause it was the first time, I believe, that the well 
attested proof of so large a yield had ever been 
made public, and because this wonderful product 
was upon the very ground on which, so long a 
time previous, he had fed his “ forlorn hope.” 
The Hon. John L. Taylor states, in his commu¬ 
nication to the Plough, the Loom and the Anvil, 
that on the 2d Nov., 1883, Gov. Allen Trimble, 
George Renick, and Gen. Duncan McArthur, 
with others, formed the “ Ohio Company for Im¬ 
porting English Cattle.” Now, sir, believing that 
none of the gentlemen engaged in that noble enter¬ 
prise, will be lessened in public esteem by my do¬ 
ing so, I will state the facts and circumstances 
which called that company into being. On that 
day the gentlemen just mentioned had been ex¬ 
amining a lot of Kentucky Durhams, descendants 
of the importation of 1817, when Mr. Renick asked 
his companions, why they could not form a com¬ 
pany, and send on to England and bring out a lot 
of improved Durhams for themselves? He said, 
truly, “We know nothing of the purity of this 
stock; the pedigrees may or may not be made up 
for the occasion.” The suggestion was approved, 
and that very day the articles of association, form¬ 
ing the first Ohio Importing Company, were signed. 
What has been the result? Ask all who have at- 
tended our valley or State fairs. Not only has 
there been no deterioration, but in the opinion of 
one of the best judges in America, Dr. Arthur 
Watts, “ he saw nothing superior to them in all 
Great Britain,” wlienhe was examining their stock 
as agent of the third and last company, formed in 
1852. In some respects, as I understand from 
him, the pure descendants of the first and second 
importations, are ahead of any thing he saw on the 
Empire Island. In every effort to improve our 
cattle, Mr. Renick has taken a leading part. There 
is an old addage, “Let honor be rendered to 
whom honor is due.” It would give me unfeigned 
pleasure to see this rule applied, justly and fully, 
to him. I think it would have a wholesome, an 
encouraging effect, upon the rising agricultural 
generation. There is no' society, State or National, 
which would not do honor to itself by passing the 
