ges his
stock so that ten or a dozen of his cows shall calve about the same
time; and then, by setting aside one or two, to find food for the entire
family, gets the remaining eight or ten with their full fountains of
milk, to carry on the operations of his dairy. Some people have an idea
that skimmed milk, if given in sufficient quantity, is good enough for
the weaning period of calf-feeding; but this is a very serious mistake,
for the cream, of which it has been deprived, contained nearly all the
oleaginous principles, and the azote or nitrogen, on which the vivifying
properties of that fluid depends. Indeed, so remarkably correct has this
fact proved to be, that a calf reared on one part of new milk mixed with
five of water, will thrive and look well; while another, treated with
unlimited skimmed milk, will be poor, thin, and miserable.

851. IT IS SOMETIMES A MATTER OF CONSIDERABLE TROUBLE to induce the
blundering calf--whose instinct only teaches him to suck, and that he
will do at anything and with anything--acquire the knowledge of
imbibition, that for the first few days it is often necessary to fill a
bottle with milk, and, opening his mouth, pour the contents down his
throat. The manner, however, by which he is finally educated into the
mystery of suction, is by putting his allowance of milk into a large
wooden bowl; the nurse then puts her hand into the milk, and, by bending
her fingers upwards, makes a rude teat for the calf to grasp in his
lips, when the vacuum caused by his suction of the fingers, causes the
milk to rise along them into his mouth. In this manner one by one the
whole family are to be fed three times a day; care being taken, that
new-born calves are not, at first, fed on milk from a cow who has some
days calved.

852. AS THE CALF PROGRESSES TOWARDS HIS TENTH WEEK, his diet requires to
be increased in quantity and quality; for these objects, his milk can be
thickened with flour or meal, and small pieces of softened oil-cake are
to be slipped into his mouth after sucking, that they may dissolve
there, till he grows familiar with, and to like the taste, when it may
be softened and scraped down into his milk-and-water. After a time,
sliced turnips softened by steam are to be given to him in tolerable
quantities; then succulent grasses; and finally, hay may be added to the
others. Some farmers, desirous of rendering their calves fat for the
butcher in as short a time as possible, forget both the