Rocky Mountain husbandman. [volume] (Diamond City, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1876-03-09

j '~UAJ SAO
sires?
If a man has so much money that he is at
a loss to know what he can do with it, he
can spend it by the tens of thousands in a
fancy cow, a fast trotter, or a fancy house,
if he likes; but will that be the measure of
his public spirit, or the worth of his pur-
chases? In fact, is he not doing a direct in
jury to society, in demoralizing his tastes,
and in the influence which leads others, not
able to do so, to live as he does? If mere
demand and supply s the true gauge OF
values, then the Tulip mania was just no
mania at all, and the world ought to have
incurred the loss Of those engaged in the
sale of the bulbs, at such fabulous prices, as
that of public benefactors, and should have
erected monuments to their memory as pio-
neers in one of the legitimate avenues of
public benefaction. And yet this is just the
shallow reasoning Of q writer who attempt
ed to answer these high prices, given, [ be-
lieve, in the Turf, Field and Farm, by saying
that O. man, who had paid $4,000 for q bull,
brought to Kentucky, had paid for him in
one year by breeders fees, and hence the
proof that he was worth the price given for
him, when it only proved that he was only
the beginning of a series of operations, fun
to the storks, but death to the frogs" Let
him apply the touchstone of public utility to
the beef-eating and beef-producing classes in
it's ultimate results, and the argument won't
hold water.
heard q prominent shorthorn breeder
say, q few days since, that this wild delusicn
would sooner or later vanish, and the price
of shorthorns be regulated by their actual
utility, and the price of individuals deter
mined, not by their being Duchesses, but by
their own merit, and that of their ancestors,
irrespective of family. But, said he, | am
obliged to Demo to this Duchess mania, or
make nothing by my cattle. Another gen
tleman, who has been, I suppose, longer in
the shorthorn business than any man in the
State-I knew him as such forty years past
said to me recently that, at one OF the
sales in the Blue Grass Region, last sum-
mer, there were two families Of cattle princi-
pally represented, both deeply imbued with
Duchess blood Oh top, but one having q
fashionable foundation, the other Young
Marys. These latter, he thought as q whole,
decidedly the superiors but, when they
came under the auctioneer's hammer, the
prices went, by long odds, in the other di-
rection.
Now, in view of all this, I have q g
ton to make that will test the sincerity and
metal OF the Duchess f~anciers. Let a ring
hn nAa,,nG fn. fTa chou" Of ooft1a nna tvYa
and three years from last September, for a
bull and four heifers, to be shown by each
man for three consecutive years, as year
lings, tWo-year-olds, and three-year-olds no
money to be paid as entrance, or given as
premium, but simply an award Of certificate
of superiority-first, as an individual of each
sex second, as a lot or herd. If one or
more animals shall die, then the party, so
losing them, to have the privilege Of supply
ing the place with another animal of the
same age, of his own raising. The judges
to be tirst-class judges of cattle, not engaged
in the shorthorn business, and to give their
word of honor that they will not inspect
them before the day of exhibition, and that
they will not know their pedigrees, and
judge as if every lot was of exactly of the
same blood.
If public spirit is at the bottom of this
matter, and an honest desire to see the COM
paratiye merits Of different families fairly
tested is really the case, then here is a way
to test it. But if the whole matter is a
speculation Of shorthorn dealers, in which
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