A 
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| the organs of nutrition. 
than in the other. The form of a truly capacious 
chest, containing large and powerful lungs, ap- 
proaches the outline-figure of a cone, and has the 
apex of this figure situated between the shoulders, 
and the base of it situated toward the loins. A 
capacious pelvis, or lower cavity of the abdomen, 
is essential in a female, in order to avoid danger 
to both herself and her offspring in the produc- 
tion of her young; and it is indicated chiefly by 
the width of the hips and the breadth of the 
space between the thighs. The breadth of the 
loins is always proportionate to that of the chest 
and the pelvis. The comparative smallness of 
the head facilitates parturition, and generally in- 
dicates superiority of breed; and a head with 
small horns, or with no horns whatever, occa- 
sions considerably more economizing of food than 
a head with large horns. The length of the neck 
ought, in order to permit an easy collecting of 
food, to be proportionate to the animal’s height. 
The muscles and the tendons, in order to permit 
an animal to travel or to work with ease and 
power, ought to be large. The bones, as com- 
pared to the muscles, ought to be small; for not 
bones but muscles are the seats of strength ; and 
large bones generally indicate imperfection in 
The several character- 
istic good properties of the several species, how- 
ever, as well as the features which indicate them, 
will be fully discussed in the articles Cartiz, 
Cow, Ox, Supnp, Horss, and Hoa. 
A question of great niceness and difficulty, and 
one which has been the topic of much discussion 
and antagonism among agricultural writers, is, 
“ Whether the breed of live stock be susceptible 
of the greatest improvement, from the qualities 
conspicuous in the male, or from those conspi- 
cuous in the female parent ?” The Highland So- 
ciety, about twenty years ago, proposed this ques- 
tion as a subject of prize essays; and afterwards 
adjudged four essays upon it to be worthy of pre- 
miums, and published them in their Transactions. 
Mr. Boswell of Balmuto, the author of one of the 
essays, asserts that the male is most influential, 
supports his opinion by an appeal to facts, and 
concludes “that the male is the parent, from 
motives of sense and sound polity, which we can 
alone look to for the improvement of our breed 
of live stock.” The Rev. Henry Berry, the au- 
thor of another of the essays, teaches that im- 
proving power in breeds is attributable, not to 
sex, but to high blood, or to animals, whether 
male or female, which have been long and success- 
fully selected and bred with a view to particular 
qualifications ; yet concludes “ that, with our 
present scanty stock of information on this diffi- 
cult question, one only rational course can be 
adopted by breeders, viz., that of resorting to the 
best male, a simple and efficacious mode of im- 
proving such stocks as require improvement, and 
the only proceeding by which stock already good 
can be preserved in excellence.” Mr. Christian 
of Mill of Forest, another of the essayists, as- 
BREEDING. 
serts that the offspring bears the closest resem- 
blance to the parent, whether male or female, 
which exerts the greater influence in the forma- 
tion of the foetus, and concludes that no indivi- 
dual animals, either male or female, can be trusted 
to for improvement, and that the best breed and 
most perfect animals of both sexes ought, in 
every instance, to be selected, Mr. Dallas of 
Edinburgh, the fourth essayist, asserts that the 
male is the more powerful for external qualities, 
and the female the more powerful for internal 
qualities, and infers that the male ought to be 
selected for the improvement of colour, coat, or 
outward form, and the female for the improve- 
ment of lactiferousness, hardiness, temper, and 
freedom from tendency to any description of in- 
ternal disease. 
The opinions of Mr, Boswell and Mr. Berry, if 
mutually combined, or if made to modify each 
other, appear to contain the whole or very nearly 
the whole of the truth upon this question; and 
the opinions of Mr. Christian and Mr. Dallas are 
altogether, or very nearly altogether, fanciful,— 
the one in theory and the other in fact. The 
power of blood, or of regular systematic, untar- 
nished breeding through a series of generations, 
appears to be so great as wholly to supersede 
mere sexual or constitutional power, — and 
though peculiarly mighty in the male, is also 
not a little distinguished in the female. A cow 
possessing excellencies by pure descent from a 
high ancestry holds them as essential elements 
of her constitution, and will transmit them in all 
their breadth and beauty to her progeny; while 
a bull, possessing by tarnished descent from a 
near ancestry or merely by a cross of breeds on 
the part of his immediate parents, holds them as 
only secondary properties of his constitution, and 
may propagate them in a very marred and muti- 
lated condition. The mare of Arabia is the 
grand object of the Bedouin’s attention, and is 
constantly and carefully maintained in a condi- 
tion of eminent excellence; and she, in conse- 
quence, bears all sway in propagation, and often 
transmits her peculiar properties in defiance of 
antagonist ones in her mate. Still the male, by 
nearly the unanimous verdict of both practical 
and scientific observers, has, caters paribus, far 
more influence than the female; so that, when 
simply equal to her in descent and in some minor 
modifying circumstances, he at once maintains 
his excellencies by a mightier energy, develops 
them with a superior force, and propagates them 
with both a fuller breadth and a higher certainty. 
He also possesses a higher money value than the 
female, and becomes connected with a vastly 
larger number of offspring; and for both these 
reasons, as well as for the sake of his greater 
constitutional influence, he demands the prime 
attention of every breeder. 
A farmer who commences to breed either cat- 
tle or sheep, ought to make first a deliberate de- 
cision as to the precise excellencies which he 
a 
