ON THE LIVE-STOCK
20-4
oxen,—land suitable for rearing them, and a constant oppor-tunity of working them at the plough,—are conjoined, a fewoxen may certainly be employed with advantage, so long onlyas the limited demand does not raise them above the grazier’sprice,—not so much because their labour is actually cheaperthan that of horses, as that, from the steadiness of theirdraught, there is less danger of accidents in breaking up oldtough swards, and because, from the quality of the land onwhich they are reared, they cannot be brought to a state ofprofitable maturity at an early age. If, to these circumstan-ces, is added their employment in a threshing-mill, the su-perior economy of a few teams of oxen is obvious, and seemsto be considerable. Accordingly, in almost the only in-stance in the southern counties of Scotland , where the em-ployment of oxen has been persisted in, all these favourablecircumstances were combined *.
It has been alleged, that oxen might also be employed withadvantage on small farms, and on such grazing farms as havebut a small portion of arable land. But here it seems ne-cessary that the labouring stock should be fit for every sortof work; and the practice of the western counties, in em-ploying young horses in such situations, is in every respectpreferable. The profit from working horses very moderate-ly, for two or three years, and selling them when at theirprime, is more than double what could be obtained by theuse of oxen for the same period.
It was formerly observed, that there are no data in thecounty reports, from which the expence of the labour ofhorses and of oxen can be accurately compared; and for thisobvious reason, that with one or two exceptions, the latterforms no part of the permanent labouring stock of the bestcultivated counties. Besides, in no instance do they work