the farm
where his father and grandfather had been tenants, he began at the age
of thirty to carry out the plans for the improvement of domestic
animals upon which he had resolved as the result of long and patient
study and reflection. He was a man of genius, energy and perseverance.
With sagacity to conceive and fortitude to perfect his designs, he
laid his plans and struggled against many disappointments, amid the
ridicule and predictions of failure freely bestowed by his
neighbors,--often against serious pecuniary embarrassments; and at
last was crowned by a wonderful degree of success. When he commenced
letting his rams, (a system first introduced by him and adhered to
during his life, in place of selling,) they brought him 17_s._ 6_d._
each, for the season. This was ten years after he commenced his
improvements. Soon the price came to a guinea, then to two or three
guineas--rapidly increasing with the reputation of his stock, until in
1784, they brought him 100 guineas each! Five years later his lettings
for one season amounted to $30,000!

With all his skill and success he seemed afraid lest others might
profit by the knowledge he had so laboriously acquired. He put no pen
to paper and at death left not even the slightest memorandum throwing
light upon his operations, and it is chiefly through his
cotemporaries, who gathered somewhat from verbal communications, that
we know anything regarding them. From these we learn that he formed an
ideal standard in his own mind and then endeavored, first by a wide
selection and a judicious and discriminating coupling, to obtain the
type desired, and then by close breeding, connected with rigorous
weeding out, to perpetuate and fix it.

After him came a host of others, not all of whom concealed their light
beneath a bushel. By long continued and extensive observation,
resulting in the collection of numerous facts, and by the collation of
these facts of nature, by scientific research and practical
experiments, certain physiological laws have been discovered, and
principles of breeding have been deduced and established. It is true
that some of these laws are as yet hidden from us, and much regarding
them is but imperfectly understood. What we do not know is a deal more
than what we do know, but to ignore so much as has been discovered,
and is well established, and can be learned by any who care to do so,
and to go on regardless of it, would indicate a degree of wisdom in
the