their ration.  The sod was kept in good condition and the field free from weeds, by the use of the mowing-machine, set high, every ten or twenty days, according to the season.  Following the mower, we use a spring-tooth rake which bunched the weeds and gathered or broke up the droppings; and everything the rake caught was carted to the manure vats.  Our big Holsteins do not suffer from close quarters, so far as I am able to judge, neither do they take on fat.  From thirty minutes to three hours (depending on the weather), is all the outing they get each day; but this seems sufficient for their needs.  The well-ventilated stable with its moderate temperature suits the sedentary nature of these milk machines, and I am satisfied with the results.  I cannot, of course, speak with authority of the comparative merits of soiling versus grazing, for I have had no experience in the latter; but in theory soiling appeals to me, and in practice it satisfies me.

When I found I could keep more cows on the land set apart for them, I built another cow stable for the dry cows and the heifers, and added four stalls to my milk stable by turning each of the hospital wards into two stalls.

The ten heifers which I reserved in the spring of 1896 were now nearly two years old.  They were expected to “come in” in the early autumn, when they would supplement the older herd.  The cows purchased in 1895 were now five years old, and quite equal to the large demand which we made upon them.  They had grown to be enormous creatures, from thirteen hundred to fourteen hundred pounds in weight, and they were proving their excellence as milk producers by yielding an average of forty pounds a day.  We had, and still have, one remarkable milker, who thinks nothing of yielding seventy pounds when fresh, and who doesn’t fall below twenty-five pounds when we are forced to dry her off.  I have no doubt that she would be a successful candidate for advanced registration if we put her to the test.  For ten months in each year these cows give such quantities of milk as would surprise a man not acquainted with this noble Dutch family.  My five common cows were good of their kind, but they were not in the class with the Holsteins.  They were not “robber” cows, for they fully earned their food; but there was no great profit in them.  To be sure, they did not eat more than two-thirds as much as the Holsteins; but that fact did not stand to their credit, for the basic principle of factory farming is to consume as much raw material as possible and to turn out its equivalent in finished product.  The common cows consumed only two-thirds as much raw material as the Holsteins, and turned out rather less than two-thirds of their product, while they occupied an equal amount of floor space; consequently they had to give place to more competent machines.  They were to be sold during the season.

Why dairymen can be found who will pay $50 apiece for cows like those I had for sale (better, indeed, than the average), is beyond my method of reckoning values.  Twice $50 will buy a young cow bred for milk, and she would prove both bread and milk to the purchaser in most cases.  The question of food should settle itself for the dairyman as it does for the factory farmer.  The more food consumed, the better for each, if the ratio of milk be the same.