the horse, is because our blacksmiths do not cut their heels as low as they do a horse’s, and consequently that part of the foot is not made to work so hard.  If you believe a mule has a ringbone, and yet is not lame, just cut his heel down low, and give him a few good pulls in a muddy place, and he will soon develop to you both lameness and ringbone.  Cut his toes down and leave his heels high, and he will not be apt to go lame with it.

The committee also say that a Mr. Elliott, of the Patuxent Furnaces, says they hardly ever had a mule die of disease.  This is a strange statement; for the poorest teams I ever saw, and the very worst bred stock, were on the Patuxent River, through the southern part of Maryland, and at the markets on Washington City.  It is pitiable to see, as you can on market days, the shabby teams driven by the farmers of eastern and southern Maryland.  A more broken-hearted, poverty-stricken, and dejected-looking set of teams can be seen nowhere else.  The people of Maryland have raised good horses; it is high time they waked up to the necessity, and even profit, of raising a better kind of mule.

In regard to the draft power of mules, in comparison with horses, there are various opinions; and yet it is one which ought to be easily settled.  I have tested mules to the very utmost of their strength, and it was very rare to find a pair that could draw thirty hundred weight a single year, without being used up completely.  Now, it is well known that in the northern and western States you can find any number of pairs of horses that will draw thirty-five and forty hundred weight anywhere.  And they will keep doing it, day after day, and retain their condition.

There was one great difficulty the Agricultural Committee of South Carolina had to contend with, and it was this.  At the time it had the subject of the mule under consideration, he was not used generally throughout the United States.  I can easily understand, therefore, that the committee obtained its knowledge from the very few persons who had them, and made the best report it could under the circumstances.  Indeed, I firmly believe the report was written with the intention of giving correct information, but it failed entirely.  In recommending any thing of this kind, great care should be taken not to lead the inexperienced astray, and to give only such facts as are obtained from thorough knowledge; and no man should be accepted as authority in the care and treatment of animals, unless he has had long experience with them, and has made them a subject of study.

A few words more on breaking the mule.  Don’t fight or abuse him.  After you have harnessed him, and he proves to be refractory, keep your own temper, slack your reins, push him round, backward and forward, not roughly; and if he will not go, and do what you want, tie him to a post and let him stand there a day or so without food or water.  Take care, also, that he does not lie down, and be careful