THE CADZOW HERD Ol WHITE CATTLE. 227 



prevails ; and though they are somewhat hindered 

 from fighting by separate enclosure, they not un- 

 frequently manage to settle the great herd question 

 as to which is the most powerful bull. Unmitigated 

 fierceness marks these conflicts, and they fight to 

 the death. In this way four bulls perished in 1885 

 and two in 1886. 



There are many tales of persons being hunted by 

 them and taking to trees ; but I cannot learn that 

 anyone ever sustained serious injury, though that 

 is due to no kindliness of theirs. Such incidents 

 appear mirth-provoking in the recital, though the 

 experience itself is more alarming than amusing. I 

 have known of several cases of this kind, and Patrick 

 among other instances gives that of a bird-catcher 

 who was once " treed " by a bull, and naively adds : 

 "here he had occasion to observe the habits of the 

 animal." 



With reference to the early history of such cattle 

 in Scotland, little is known of a satisfactory kind. 



Hector Boece or Boethius published (1526-7) his 

 Scotorum Historic?, which appears to have been 

 written mainly to magnify the glory and wonder- 

 fulness of Scotland. He describes the wild cattle of 

 the country ; and probably influenced by reminiscences 

 of Caesar's description of the great, long-horned, wild, 

 and untamable Uri of the Hyrcinian Forest, and 

 confident that Scotland must possess bulls as good, 

 he evolved an animal of the ox kind with a dash of 

 the heraldic Scottish lion. He says that in the 

 Caledonian Forest there w^ere bulls of the purest 

 white, having manes like the lion ("boves candidissimos 

 in formam leonis jubam ferentes ") ; and that though 

 in other parts of the body they resembled tame cattle, 

 they were wild and untamable, shunning man. He 

 relates that the Bruce was saved from an angry 

 white bull by a powerful man, thereafter known 

 as Turnbull from his feat in seizing the bull by the 

 horns and throwing it down. 



Bellenden reduced Boece's Latin into Scottish — it 



Q 



