in zoology, the young of the ox kind.

There are two ways of breeding calves that are intended to be reared. The one is to let the calf run about with its dam all the year round; which is the method in the cheap breeding countries, and is generally allowed to make the best cattle. The other is to take them from the dam after they have sucked about a fortnight: they are then to be taught to drink flat milk, which is to be made but just warm for them, it being very dangerous to give it them too hot. The best time of weaning calves is from January to May: they should have milk for 12 weeks after; and a fortnight before that is left off, water should be mixed with the milk in larger and larger quantities. When the calf has been fed on milk for about a month, little whips of hay should be placed all about him in cleft sticks to induce him to eat. In the beginning of April they should be turned out to graze; only for a few days they should be taken in for the night, and have milk and water given them: the same may also be given them in a pail sometimes in the field, till they are so able to feed themselves that they do not regard it. The grazes they are turned into must not be too rank, but short and sweet, that they may like it, and yet get it with some labour. Calves should always be weaned at grazes; for if it be done with hay and water, they often grow big-belly'd on it, and are apt to rot. When those among the males are selected which are to be kept as bulls, the rest should be kept for oxen: the sooner the better. Between 10 and 20 days is a proper age. About London almost all the calves are fattened for the butcher. The reason of this is, that there is a good market for them; and the lands there are not so profitable to breed upon as in cheaper countries. The way to make calves fat and fine is, the keeping them very clean; giving them fresh litter every day; and the hanging a large chalk-stone in some corner where they can easily get at it to lick it, but where it is out of the way of being fouled by their dung and urine. The coops are to be placed so as not to have too much fun upon them, and so high above the ground that the urine may run off. They also bleed them once when they are a month old, and a second time before they kill. kill them; which is a great addition to the beauty and whiteness of their flesh: the bleeding is by some repeated much oftener, but this is sufficient. Calves are very apt to be loose in their bowels; which wastes and very much injures them. The remedy is to give them chalk scraped among milk, pouring it down with a horn. If this does not succeed, they give them bole armenic in large doses, and use the cold bath every morning. If a cow will not let a strange calf suck her, the common method is to rub both her nose and the calf's with a little brandy; this generally reconciles them after a few feedings.

Golden Calf, an idol set up and worshipped by the Israelites at the foot of Mount Sinai in their passage through the wilderness to the land of Canaan. Our version makes Aaron fashion this calf with a graving tool after he had cast it in a mould: the Geneva translation makes him engrave it first, and cast it afterwards. Others, with more probability, render the whole verse thus: "And Aaron received them (the golden earrings), and tied them up in a bag, and got them cast into a molten calf;" which version is authorised by the different senses of the word tsur, which signifies to tie up or bind, as well as to shape or form; and of the word cherret, which is used both for a graving tool and a bag. Some of the ancient fathers have been of opinion that this idol had only the face of a calf, and the shape of a man from the neck downwards, in imitation of the Egyptian Ibis. Others have thought it was only the head of an ox without a body. But the most general opinion is, that it was an entire calf in imitation of the Apis worshipped by the Egyptians; among whom, no doubt, the Israelites had acquired their propensity to idolatry. This calf Moses is said to have burnt with fire, reduced to powder, and thrown upon the water which the people were to drink. How this could be accomplished hath been a question. Most people have thought, that as gold is indestructible, it could only be burnt by the miraculous power of God; but M. Stahl conjectures that Moses dissolved it by means of liver of sulphur*. The Rabbins tell us that the people were made to drink of this water in order to distinguish the idolaters from the rest; for that as soon as they had drunk of it, the beards of the former turned red. The cabbalists add, that the calf weighed 125 quintals; which they gather from the Hebrew word maftekab, whose numerical letters make 125.

Calf-Skins, in the leather manufacture, are prepared and dressed by the tanners, skinners, and curriers, who sell them for the use of the shoe-makers, saddlers, bookbinders, and other artificers, who employ them in their several manufactures.

Calf-Skin dressed in finnach, denotes the skin of this animal curried black on the hair side, and dyed of an orange colour on the flesh side, by means of sumach, chiefly used in the making of belts.

The English calf-skin is much valued abroad, and the commerce thereof very considerable in France and other countries; where divers attempts have been made to imitate it, but hitherto in vain. What is like to baffled all endeavours for imitating the English calf in France is, the smallness and weakness of the calves about Paris; which at fifteen days old are not so big as the English ones when they come into the world.

Sea-Calf. See Phoca.