‘dency toward the origination of disease ; it also 
possesses a peculiarly nutritive power, and a 
strongly viscid condition, well adapted and most 
evidently intended for the early invigoration and 
support of the young animal; so that to with- 
hold it is to contravene the wise provision of the 
all-beneficent framer of the animal economy, 
and to incur the certain hazard of damaging the 
young animal’s health, and seriously diminishing 
its value. “Nature,” remarks Mr. Marshall, 
“has evidently prepared milk of a peculiar qual- 
ity for the infant calf; and this milk is useless in 
the dairy: it is therefore doubly good manage- 
ment to suffer the calf to remain at the teat, un- 
til the milk becomes useful in the dairy; which 
it usually does in two or three days. But al- 
though it becomes, to general appearance, simi- 
lar to that of a cow which has been longer in 
milk, it is highly probable that it is still singu- 
larly adapted to the yet infant state of the calf. 
In the suckling-houses round the metropolis, it 
is well understood, that putting a young calf to 
a cow which is old in milk, will throw it into 
| scouring.” 
The destination of calves, whether for early 
| slaughter, for fattening into fine condition on 
milk, or for rearing to maturity in connexion 
with either grazing or the dairy, must depend 
partly on a farmer’s notions: of stock-manage- 
ment, partly on the character and economics of 
his farm, and very largely on his comparative 
distance from a good veal market. In dairy dis- 
tricts, many female calves and almost all male 
ones are slaughtered when very young,—most of 
| them when only one or two days old. Yet the 
flesh of all unfed or but slightly fed calves is both 
unpalatable and unwholesome, and is popularly 
denounced by the Lowland Scotch as “slink 
| veal,” and sarcastically, known among the Irish 
_ bogtrotters as “staggering bob,” and is prohib- 
| ited from use, on pain of civil penalty, among 
| both the Swiss and the French. In pastoral dis- 
_ tricts, especially such as are far from markets, 
| calves require to be carefully reared as grazing- 
stock, and therefore incur small hazard of being 
| hurriedly surrendered to the slaughter; and in 
| many a dairy district, where their existence is 
at present. tolerated only for the sake of milk, 
and where it is generally brought to a very 
speedy termination, they might, with a little 
better management, be made good food and the 
occasion of fair profit. So very competent a judge 
as Mr. Aiton of Hamilton does not hesitate to 
| say, respecting the early slaughtering of calves 
in so fine a dairy district as that of Strathaven, 
| “This is certainly bad economy,—for as milk can 
not be turned to more profitable account than in 
feeding calves till they are from four to six weeks 
old, it must be bad management to kill any of 
them when only a few days old. Veal, when mo- 
derately fat, is an excellent species of animal 
food, and can be brought to market with greater 
“CALF. 
of calves is a simple and easy process ; and as the 
milk of a cow should not be used as human food 
till a week after she has calved, and as milk can- 
not be more profitably used than in feeding 
calves for a few weeks, it betrays great ignorance 
and want of economy to kill any of them till 
they are fed on the milk of their dams for at 
least four weeks. 
in these countries will taste the milk of a cow, 
till about a week after she has dropped her calf.” 
As a general rule, however, every farmer ought 
to calculate whether the milk of his cows will 
yield the largest returns when used for butter, | 
for cheese, for veal, or for pork and bacon; and 
will find a large element in his calculations for | 
veal, or for the milk-fattening of calves, to be 
nearness to a market in which veal brings good 
prices and is in steady request. 
be safely removed from place to place only by 
carriage ; and when the distance to a good mar- | 
ket for them is great, the expense of carriage | 
may decidedly counterbalance the profits of sale. 
So powerfully does the mere circumstance of dis- 
tance from market control the uses of milk in 
the districts around London, that the whole | 
country, as far as the influence of the London | 
market can be felt, is divided into successive | 
zones for respectively milking, calf- fattening, 
butter-making, cheese-making, and pork-fatten- 
ing. The zone immediately around London, to 
the breadth of about eight or ten miles, is de- | 
voted to the supply of the metropolis with milk ; 
the next zone, to the’ distance of from ten to | 
thirty miles from London, is devoted to the suck- | 
ling of calves and lambs, for the supply of veal | 
and lamb; the third zone, to the distance of | 
from thirty to seventy or eighty miles from Lon- 
don, is devoted to the supply of fresh butter; 
and the districts beyond the third zone are | 
partly of miscellaneous character, partly con- | 
trolled by nearer markets, and partly devoted to 
the supply of bacon and ham. 
Every farmer within the suckling district for 
the supply of veal to London, keeps from six | 
cows to upwards of a dozen, and employs all their | 
milk in the feeding and fattening of calves. He 
sells cows which cease to give milk, and buys 
others which are far advanced in pregnancy ; 
and thus contrives to have a constant and nearly 
uniform flow of milk. If his cow-house be single, | 
This is generally done in | 
France, Belgium, and Holland; and no person | 
Fat calves can | 
649 | 
it is fitted up with a range of calf-pens behind | 
the cows; and if it be double, it is occupied 
with pens, from end to end, along the middle. 
The pens are boarded enclosures, merely large 
enough to allow the calves to turn themselves, 
four feet high, floored with pierced boards, 
raised at least one foot above the earthen floor, 
and provided with a small box or manger, to 
contain some chalk as a remedy against fever. 
The stages used in Gloucester for pail-fed calves, 
are pronounced by Mr. Marshall to be of “an 
admirable construction,’ and described as fol- 
