standard.  We waste time on her, and the smooth running of the factory is interrupted.  I’m going to place a standard on this farm of nine thousand pounds a year for each matured cow; I don’t think that too high.  If a cow falls much below that amount, she must give place to a better one, for I’m not making this experiment entirely for my health.  The standard isn’t too high, yet it’s enough to give a fine profit.  It means at least three hundred and fifty pounds of butter a year, and in this case the butter means at least thirty cents a pound, or more than $100 a year for each cow.  This is all profit, if one wishes to figure it by itself, for the skimmed milk will more than pay for the food and care.  But why did you say dehorn the cows?”

“Well, I notice that a man with a club is almost sure to find some use for it.  If he isn’t pounding the fence or throwing it at a dog, he’s snipping daisies or knocking the heads off bull-thistles.  He’s always doing something with it just because he has it in his hand.  It’s the same way with a cow.  If she has horns, she’ll use them in some way, and they take her mind off her business.  No, sir; a cow will do a lot better without horns.  There’s mighty little to distract her attention when her clubs are gone.”

“What breeds of cows have you handled, Thompson?”

“Not any thoroughbreds that I know of; mostly common kinds and grade Jerseys or Holsteins.”

“I’m going to put a small herd of thorough bred Holsteins on the place.”

“Why don’t you try thoroughbred Jerseys’ They’ll give as much butter, and they won’t eat more than half as much.”

“You don’t quite catch my idea, Thompson.  I want the cow that will eat the most, if she is, at the same time, willing to pay for her food.  I mean to raise a lot of food, and I want a home market for it.  What comes from the land must go back to it, or it will grow thin.  The Holstein will eat more than the Jersey, and, while she may not make more butter, she will give twice as much skimmed milk and furnish more fertilizer to return to the land.  Fresh skimmed milk is a food greatly to be prized by the factory-farm man; and when we run at full speed, we shall have three hundred thousand pounds of it to feed.

“I have purchased twenty three-year-old Holstein cows, in calf to advanced registry bulls, and they are to be delivered to me March 10.  I shall want you to go and fetch them.  I also bought a young bull from the same herd, but not from the same breeding.  These twenty-one animals will cost, by the time they get here, $2200.  I shall give the bull to my neighbor Jackson.  He will be proud to have it, and I shall be relieved of the care of it.  Be good to your neighbor, Thompson, if by so doing you can increase the effectiveness of the factory farm.  We will start the dairy with twenty thoroughbreds and six scrubs.  I shall probably buy and sell from time to time; but of one thing I am certain:  if a cow cannot make our standard, she goes to the butcher, be she mongrel or thoroughbred.  What do you think of Judson as a probable dairyman?”