88 



CATTLE. 



CHAr. III. 



existed from time immemorial at Chartley, closely resemble 

 the cattle at Chillingham, but are larger, " with some small 

 difference in the colour of the ears." " They frequently tend 

 to become entirely black ; and a singular superstition prevails 

 in the vicinity that, when a black calf is born, some calamity 

 impends over the noble house of Ferrers. All the black 

 calves are destroyed." The cattle at Burton Constable in 

 Yorkshire, now extinct, had ears, muzzle, and the tip of the 

 tail black. Those at Gisburne, also in Yorkshire, are said by 

 Bewick to have been sometimes without dark muzzles, with 

 the inside alone of the ears brown ; and they are elsewhere 

 said to have been low in stature and hornless. 51 



The several above-specified differences in the park-cattle, 

 slight though they be, are worth recording, as they show that 

 animals living nearly in a state of nature, and exposed to 

 nearly uniform conditions, if not allowed to roam freely and 

 to cross with other herds, do not keep as uniform as truly 

 wild animals. For the preservation of a uniform character, 

 even within the same park, a certain degree of selection — that 

 is, the destruction of the dark-coloured calves — is apparently 

 necessary. 



Boyd Dawkins believes that the park-cattle are descended 

 from anciently domesticated, and not truly wild animals ; 

 and from the occasional appearance of dark-coloured calves, 

 it is improbable that the aboriginal Bos primigenius was white. 

 It is curious what a strong, though not invariable, tendency 

 there is in wild or escaped cattle to become white with 

 coloured ears, under widely different conditions of life. If 

 the old writers Boethius and Leslie 52 can be trusted, the 



51 I am much indebted to the 

 present Earl of Tankerville tor infor- 

 mation about his wild cattle ; and for 

 the skull which was sent to Prof. 

 Kutimeyer. The fullest account of 

 the Chillingham cattle is given by 

 Mr. Hindmarsh, together with a 

 letter by the late Lord Tankerville, 

 in 'Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,' 

 vol. ii., 1839, p. 274. See Bewick, 

 'Quadrupeds,' 2nd edit., 1791, p. 35, 

 note. With r°SDect to those of the 



Duke of Queensberry, see Pennant's 

 'Tour in Scotland,' p. 109. For those 

 of Chartley, see Low's ' Domesticated 

 Animals of Britain,' 1845, p. 238. 

 For those of Gisburne, see Bewick's 

 1 Quadrupeds,' and ' Encyclop. of Rural 

 Sports,' p. 101. 



52 Boethius was born in 1470 ; 

 'Annals and Mag. of Nat. Hist.,' vol. 

 ii., 1839, p. 281; and vol. iv. 1849 

 p. 424. 



