The goodness of meat depends much on the season of the year. Thus the flesh of most full grown quadrupeds is in the highest season during the first months of winter. Beef and mutton are in the greatest perfection in the months of November, December, and January. Pork is only good in winter; during the summer months it is not wholesome. Venison is in the highest season from the middle of June to the beginning of September. Lamb and veal during the summer months. The distinguishing sign of young and old meat is, that in the latter the fat is chiefly collected in masses, or layers external to the muscles; while in the former it is more interspersed among the muscular fibres, giving the flesh a marbled appearance. The quality of animal food is also considerably influenced by the sex; that of the female (which sooner attains perfection) being always more delicate and finer grained than that of the male, whose fibres and flavour are stronger and more rank. But this rule prevails only during the early age of the female; for, as it grows older, it gets tougher, instead of mellowing by age as the male does. Over fat meat should not be chosen; as sheep in the first stage of the rot, or about four weeks after becoming tainted, feed inordinately, and are much disposed to fatten; which propensity graziers and butchers omit no opportunity to promote, in order to increase their profits. Excessive fatness is, therefore, no bad sign for judging of the unwholesomeness, or rather rottenness of mutton, as it is generally produced artificially. Meat that has been over driven, and killed, as the butchers term it, _on the drift_, should be always rejected as unwholesome; besides, it weighs heavier than if the animal had been killed while its blood was in a healthy state; for, by the over-driving the blood has been so diffused in the cellular membrane, that it cannot be drawn off by bleeding; and the meat is heavier to the benefit of the butcher, but to the loss of the consumer. The florid colour of meat is a sign of the blood not having been properly drawn away. The whiteness of the flesh of lamb and veal is often produced by feeding the animal with milk in which chalk is mingled, or by tying it up in a stall with a piece of chalk covered with salt constantly before it to lick. Sometimes calves are suspended by their hind legs with the head downwards for hours together, and then bled to death slowly, for the purpose of whitening the flesh. And, among the other complicated and lengthened acts of cruelty, to which avarice resorts to extract the largest possible price from the sufferings of a poor harmless creature, is the tying of calves together by the hind legs, and suffering them to remain suspended across the back of a horse, with their heads downwards, for hours together, in their way from market; a practice adopted by butchers for the purpose of rendering the meat of the body as white as possible.