The vital resistance of horned cattle is so feeble, that those animals which are periodically exhibited in the north of London, though certainly chosen from among the most healthy and robust, could not herd together in large numbers for the space of a month in the Agricultural Hall at Islington, without sinking under infectious and contagious diseases--almost one and all. Under the conditions in which we see them in that Show, a single month would be sufficient to produce almost their complete destruction; for even a single week, which is the usual duration of their confinement, affects them so much as to render a large proportion of them unhealthy.
Every one knows how apt cavalry horses are to sicken and die off during a campaign. Every one has heard of the fearful ravages amongst the horses of the Allied armies during the Crimean war, when many companies were dismounted owing to this mortality.
Let us now transport ourselves in thought into the middle of those immense steppes where vast and innumerable herds of herbivorous animals are being bred for our supply, and consider what will be the effects on their health and life if they should be afflicted with a scarcity of forage, in consequence of this long dry summer.
It is unnecessary to say that there exist in Russia, in Hungary, in Australia, in North and South America, and in many other parts of the globe, large tracts of country which are still uninhabited, whose uncultivated soil supplies with food great numbers of sheep and cattle. These spacious tracts, known as moorlands or steppes, particularly abound in Russia, on the banks of the Wolga, the Don, the Dnieper; in Hungary, on the banks of the Danube; and also in South America, in the republics of Venezuela, New Granada, Columbia, &c.
Now, in hot and rainy seasons these steppes teem with rich and luxuriant verdure; the plants growing up in the marshes are prolific and abundant, and even those parts of the wild moors which produce nothing but heath are capable of feeding and fattening flocks and herds.
Under conditions so auspicious as these, animals may still suffer, but in what way? By excess of food, or repletion. They are in general robust and healthy, and thus fortified they inhale without detriment the deleterious gases of oxygen with carbon, carburetted hydrogen and the like, exhaled by the plants which grow out of the swampy soils. Thus protected, too, they are proof against the fluctuations of the seasons, and against every injury which threatens them; and their strong and sound condition enables them to sustain the fatigues of their long and arduous journeys, and to supply the rich countries of the West with their flesh, fleece, and hides.