WHITE CATTLE : AN INQUIRY INTO THEIR ORIGIN, ETC. 225 



found. Bv the time of the Roman invasion a certain extent of 

 clearing must have been effected by the natives, who mustered in 

 considerable numbers, sometimes fighting in chariots, and who 

 possessed horses and herds of cattle, for which pasture land was 

 necessary. The Romans effected further clearances, laro;elv of a 

 destructive character ; but their historians, who furnish us with 

 the earliest written contributions towards our history, s^ive but 

 little definite information as to the forests of Scotland, althousjh 

 incidental mention of woods is not wanting, such as occur in 

 passages in Tacitus's '' Life of Agricola." Thev distinguish a 

 particular portion of the country as " Sylva Caledonia " 

 (Pliny iv. 30) or " Caledonias Silva " (Ptolemy), the Caledonian 

 Forest, probably because it was the densest woodland they knew 

 in Scotland. This seems to have extended on the south from 

 about the heads of Loch Long and Loch Lomond by the line of 

 the Forth to Stirling, stretching northwards of this line as far as 

 Dunkeld. Mr. Watt pointed out that modern, and particularly 

 recent, writers have extended the limits of this oreat wood, until 

 bv their license it is said to have covered the whole of the 

 Scottish mainland south of Sutherland. This he held to be 

 unhistorical and misleading, however fine it might be from a 

 sentimental point of view. For instance, in his opinion, to say, 

 as is frequently done, that the fine old oaks at Cadzow originally 

 were part of the Caledonian Forest is an error, as Cadzow is 

 outwith the bounds of the original forest ; and the loose way of 

 speaking of many old pieces of woodland as " remains of the 

 ancient Caledonian Forest" is just as inaccurate. "Sylva 

 Caledonia" seems to have been only a definite district, and the 

 names of the woods which occurred elsewhere in these earlv times 

 have not come down to us.^ 



It is also stated that the skulls of the white cattle show that 

 they are degenerate descendants of the Bos primigenius found in 

 Pleistocene deposits. There seems to be only one solitary 

 authority for this statement, namelv, Professor Riitimever, of Basle, 



1 " La most cases in which forest was used with reference to these cattle, it 

 meant little more than the fell does to a Cumberland farmer, ^.e., the open 

 ground beyond the fields, where sheep and beasts roam about, at any rate 

 during Summer." Professor T. M 'Kenny Hughes, in lit., 26th_Xovember, 

 1898. 



