I EEE 
| strongest and greenest ? 
SHELTER. 
be continued too long, as a man or animal may 
recover from incipient consumption ; but is not 
the constitution of both tried and their existence 
perilled? and if these trials and risks might 
have been prevented, ought they not to have 
been so ?—Again, why is the grass always green- 
est or the crop most luxuriant by the side of a 
shelter? It is not because most manure has 
been applied there, for very probably no manure 
whatever has been applied there. But suppose 
equal manure to have been applied, still the 
question remains, Why is the crop there both 
It is because there 
you will see the dew resting, like silver, on every 
| spike, affording its nourishment undisturbed. 
| like a mother nursing her infant in some nook 
sheltered from the wind, and only exposed to 
the sun, and soft and gentle air. To such a 
_ corner the hardiest animal is happy to repair, to 
feed or ruminate, even in the kindliest season; 
how much more when the cold and blighting 
wind is raging and the tempest of rain or snow ? 
And these cold winds rage with us much too 
often, especially in spring, when both plants and 
animals require most to be sheltered from them. 
But if in spring shelter is necessary, it is not less 
expedient in every season, as not only averting 
disease from plants and animals, but effecting a 
vast saving of food and energy to both. I have 
lately read, in a most respectable English Jour- 
nal, the result apparently of some experiments 
on the very subject on which I have been rea- 
soning. They are headed, ‘ Effects of Cold and 
Heat in Fattening,’ and are abridged as follows: 
—‘It is well known that cattle do not fatten so 
well in cold weather as in hot. The reason is 
this. The fat is a highly carbonized substance, 
formed by animals from their carbonaceous food. 
In cold weather, the carbon in this food is con- 
sumed in keeping up the heat of the animal, 
which is at that season more rapidly carried off. 
This is also illustrated in an experiment made 
by Lord Ducie at Whitfield. One hundred 
sheep were placed in a shed, and ate 21 lbs. of 
swedes, each, per day, another hundred were 
placed in the open air, and ate 25 lbs. of swedes 
per day, yet, at the end of a certain period, the 
sheep which were protected, although they had 
a fifth less food, weighed 3 lbs. a-head more than 
the unprotected sheep. The reason of this,’ it is 
continued, ‘is obvious: the exposed sheep had 
their carbonaceous food consumed in keeping up 
their animal heat,’—that is, as he has mentioned, 
from being carried off by the air; as it is long 
since it has been established, that a man would 
lose more weight from being exposed without 
covering, by exsiccation, than he would in the 
same time by perspiration, though in the warmest 
dress. ‘Warmth,’ continues the reporter, ‘is 
thus seen to be an equivalent for food,’—mean- 
ing, in this case, to animals, but I say also to 
plants; and to both the result is from saving of 
waste. ‘This is also established by the fact that 
205 
two hives of bees do not consume so much honey 
when together as when separate, on account of 
the warmth being greater. Cattle, from the 
same reason, thrive much better when kept warm 
than when exposed to cold.’ 
“We have, therefore, thus established, at one 
and the same time, at once the direct advantage 
and the economy of warmth; for warmth is not 
only productive of health and strength to. the 
animal, but these at a greatly reduced expense 
of food. Hold the advantage or saving to be 
only 20 per cent.,—and, from the experiment 
quoted, it is shown to be greatly more; and 
what an immense sum would this be, spread 
over the flocks and herds maintained by pasture 
in these kingdoms? There is another view,— 
the loss of sheep, and lambs in particular, from 
casualties, including want of warmth ; and, from 
a distinct record of this description now before 
me, kept by an intelligent shepherd for 17 years, 
the mean annual loss of old sheep or hoggs is 
205 per cent., or upwards of one-fifth! and this 
without reckoning the loss of lambs, estimated 
also at 20 per cent.; or converting the lambs 
into sheep, raising the per centage in general to 
27 per cent. And this last estimate has reference 
to a southland farm. What the losses are on 
the unapproachable hills, and in the chasms and 
gullies of the west and north, has never, perhaps, 
been attempted to be shown; but, in their pre- 
sent neglected condition, it may be conceived.— 
And as gainful as warmth is in the case of ani- 
mals, it is certainly also in the case of plants,— 
perhaps more so. For though in plants also we 
find the strong stem can with more probability 
recover the effects of a blight, it, at the same 
time, suffers by it with more intensity, and re- 
quires, consequently, a corresponding waste of 
food and energy to recover it, that is, of manure 
and of sun; which last, though costing no direct 
expense, is the last thing that should be wasted 
in this climate, because, in this climate, such 
waste is ruinous.—And what so contributes to 
warmth as shelter? What so completely econo- 
mizes the heat both of the earth and of the sun? 
And how does it economize both, and the dews 
and gases they evolve between them? By pre- 
serving them from being swept away, and by 
allowing them to be generated in the greatest 
quantity and of the highest temperature. If 
we will only walk in the street of a city exposed 
to the sun, we shall have a perfect example of 
how the heat is economized and the temperature 
increased. From reverberation it becomes at 
last painful, if combined with a moderate de- 
gree of calm. In the neighbourhood of a wood 
facing the sun, or in an enclosure formed by 
shelters of moderate height, the illustration is 
both more pleasing and more complete. There the 
heat is less reverberated. It is absorbed by the 
earth, and rendered at once more genial and less 
oppressive. But a moderate degree of heat, thus 
economized, is indeed of the utmost utility. The 
