Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1882-03-09
The Little Butter Cow at Home.

it was square it would be six and
three quarter miles on each side.
However, this little piece of land
suffices to keep 10000 head of cat
tie; that is to say, in round numbers,
supports one animal for each two
acres of its territory, this including
rocks, roads, barren land the builds
ing lots necessary to the housing of
$4,000 inhabitants. And it has been
thus for the last twenty years, at
least. Indeed, the census of 1861
gives 1907 as the number of cattle
in the island of Jersey. What is
still more remarkable, it exports
each year about 1000 head (the av-
erage of expectations, according to
the custom-house reports, being
2,049 for the last eighteen years.
nearly one head for each ten acres.
Now the total number of cattle in
England gives only one for ten acres;
it follows then that in proportion to
its extent the island of Jersey ex-
ports each year more cattle than
England contains. In other words,
if England should export at the
same rate, all her cattle would
be gone in single year.
and she would not have left single
hoof. The system which permits the
island of Jersey to attain this result
deserves to be studied above all at
this time, when the English farmer
knows not what to do, his sheetean-
chors the culture of wheat, leaving
him to drift on the rocks. But an
other result not less striking than
the keeping of the cattle at the Jer-
sey is the race of cattle that 1t has
produced. At present it is the Gus
tom in England TO consider the Jer
seys as the pampered tavorites of
fortune, playthings for the rich, dia-
monds to ornament the lawn, giving
a small quantity of very rich milk,
cream and butter for those who are
rich enough to afford this extrava>-
gance. That they are small we adj
NIT; beautiful, we concede; but why
should they not be small =? And why
not beautiful? Is the shepherd-dog
less bold, less useful or less suited to
its special work because it is not a
mastiff? The ability to do the work
required is the thing sought for; the
rest is only fashion and tnsel. The
work of the Jersey is to convert grass
10 hat tn
beef. She is not raised to be eaten;
she has more value as a machine
to produce butter. Then why should
she be larger? And far from
being luxury for the rich
man, she is, more than any other
race, the dependence of the poor,
the best aid of small farming. This
is very easily and simply proved Gin
a general way by the experience of
the Island of Jersey. We have seen
that they keep their $4,000 head of
cattle on six miles square, there
where the farms are smaller than
any where else; there where each
farmer works with his hands and is
lace. TO lace Will the "Oli lndt lie
needs must keep from the door. And
what do we see? An island eaten
up by cattle and the farmers beg>
ging? On the contrary, all the
country is like garden, everywhere
sown with improvements and COM
Portable houses and of which the as
pect shows the well being. One
finds everywhere comfort and plenty,
and nowhere poverty, misery or beg,
gars.
l do not claim that all this is the
work of the cows, but I say that
these farmers who have so serious a
struggle to live, and who yet obtain
SO marvellous success should know
their business, and not keep 10000
head of cattle at loss. If the Jer
seys are profitable there, with the
land at SO per acre, will they not
give profit in England, and every
where else where their is market
for butter? But we will 60 further :;
we claim that the Jersey COW is the
handsomest of all COWS, as well as
the most profitable.