inferior stock. He therefore bent his energies to
raise the standard of excellence in domestic animals.

By slow stages of animal improvement the ugly, thin-flanked wild boar of
early times has been transformed into the sleek Berkshire or the
well-rounded Poland-China. In the same manner the wild sheep of the Old
World have been developed into wool and mutton breeds of the finest
excellence. By constant care, attention, and selection the thin,
long-legged wild ox has been bred into the bounteous milk-producing
Jerseys and Holsteins or into the Shorthorn mountains of flesh. From the
small, bony, coarse, and shaggy horse of ancient times have descended
the heavy Norman, or Percheron, draft horse and the fleet Arab courser.

The matter of meat-production is one of vital importance to the human
race, for animal food must always supply a large part of man's ration.

Live stock of various kinds consume the coarser foods, like the grasses,
hays, and grains, which man cannot use. As a result of this consumption
they store in their bodies the exact substances required for building up
the tissues of man's body.

When the animal is used by man for food, one class of foods stored away
in the animal's body produces muscle; another produces fat, heat, and
energy. The food furnished by the slaughter of animals seems necessary
to the full development of man. It is true that the flesh of an animal
will not support human life so long as would the grain that the animal
ate while growing, but it is also true that animal food does not require
so much of man's force to digest it. Hence the use of meat forces a part
of man's life-struggle on the lower animal.

When men feed grain to stock, the animals receive in return power and
food in their most available forms. Men strengthen the animal that they
themselves may be strengthened. One of the great questions, then, for
the stock-grower's consideration is how to make the least amount of food
fed to animals produce the most power and flesh.

SECTION LIII. HORSES

While we have a great many kinds of horses in America, horses are not
natives of this country. Just where wild horses were first tamed and
used is not certainly known. It is believed that in early ages the horse
was a much smaller animal than it now is, and that it gradually attained
its present size. Where food was abundant and nutritious and the climate
mild and healthful, the early horses developed large frames and heavy
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