158 ON THE WEST HIGHLAND BREED OF CATTLE. 



although now and then an anxious jobber or shrewd breeder 

 thinks proper to send a lot to salesmen in Dumfries and other 

 marts. Choice lots, too, are often picked up at home by 

 graziers, who scour the most faithful districts in the autumn 

 for the purpose of obtaining their usual supplies for wiuterage. 

 The great staple of the Falkirk Tryst used to be cattle of the 

 West Highland breed ; but the extension of sheep husbandry 

 within the past thirty or forty years has rendered the trade in 

 the woolly tribe scarcely less important than that in grazing 

 cattle. Every isle and holm, and every mainland glen at the 

 time referred to, poured in its interesting droves, shaggy and 

 black, or relieved only as to colour by a sprinkling of reds, and 

 of duns, graduating from mouse to cream colour ; and notwith- 

 standing that the breeds and crosses exhibited at Falkirk were 

 exceedingly various, the carefully-bred West Highlanders were 

 still the flower of the show. They attracted every one's atten- 

 tion, and engaged every one's conversation : every individual 

 beast was a delight to the eye of a connoisseur, and a study to 

 the eye of an artist. What made the market more interesting 

 to strangers was the fact that many of the cattle were brought 

 to the tryst by their breeders, and it was not an uncommon 

 sight to behold the neatly-formed stots and queys driven to the 

 market-stance by a kilted laird from the Hebrides, whose 

 language was to Lowlanders quite as curious as the dress he 

 wore. 



To speak generally, every one of these animals had its 

 predestined course ; the choicest of the duns, the creams, the 

 reds and the brindles were bought up by agents to grace the 

 parks of English nobles, where the great variety and contrast 

 in colour had a grand and imposing appearance. Many dealers 

 perferred the black type, as being more hardy, so that there 

 was generally a sufficient demand for all colours. The young 

 six-quarter was destined to clean ujd rough pastures and eat a 

 little straw in Clydesdale, Dumfriesshire, Cumberland, and the 

 neighbouring districts, and well it throve on such fare ; the 

 older of the small cattle were taken to Brough Hill in West- 

 moreland, a very important fair with dealers, because it was said 

 to be attended by more gentlemen's bailiffs than any other in the 

 United Kingdom ; the finest West Highland heifers found their 

 way into Yorkshire and the Vale of the Tees, where the short- 

 horn had its origin; and what steers were not required by 

 graziers in the home districts of Argyll, Perth, Dumbarton, Ayr, 

 and Fife, were usually consigned to Leicester, Northampton, and 

 Buckingham. 



In the bygone times alluded to, Joseph M. Eichardson, Esq., 

 land-steward to Sir Henry Ralph Vane, Bart., of Armathwaite 

 Hall and Hutton Hall, annually bought a splendid drove in the 



