THE

AGRICULTURAL MAGAZINE.

No. LIL] DECEMBER, 1803.[VorL. IX.

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REMARKS ON THE PRIZE CATTLE.

To the Editor of the Agricultural Magazine.

SIR,

p En prize“ cattle lately exhibited in Smithfield have

attracted 50 much notice, that I presume a few cursory obscrvations regarding them you will not consider unac- ceptable.

"here are few Subjects which in a great capital can be more interesting than this exhibition, because it is connected with Some of the most essential articles of human Subsistence, It is Satisfactory that the persons appointed as judges on the occasion, are men of great respectability, whose employments in life have rendered them competent to the duty imposed upon them; and we believe it will be universally acknow- ledged, that the preference has been given at this time with great judgment, and with perfect impartiality, If any doubt may be entertained of correct decision, it is in the application of the prizes in the ninth class, which consists of the Swine, The title of Bedford has been 80 long at the head of every dis- tinetion of improvement in agriculture, that 1 Should have been extremely Sorry not to have obsgerved the continuance pf its protection and patronage, under the new character by which its honours are Sustained.--Five of the prizes on the Present occasion are awarded to that Nobleman.

Some of the amateurs on this Subject will recollect, that the prizes were formerly assigned to the most gigantic and disproportionate animals, pampered by every expedient of art; which occasioned these ironical remarks from a- foreign agriculturist.“ It gave me(Says he) the greatest Satisfaction 10 See, that animals which are here the Size of an ordigary English bull-dog, you are capable of expanding to the mag- nitude of an Indian elephant; yet with heads the Size ot a rat, and with bones the consistence of a gristle. 1 have Sedu- Jously attended to the mode of treatment that was necesSary to produce this extraordinary change; and 1 have been mortified with the discovery, that for every pound of fleSh you obtain, you expend ten times its value in provender to produce the artiicia] tumour." It will afford Satisfaction not only to this.ingenious foreigner, but to the whole country, to notice,

4g. Mag. Vol. 9. BE IEEE