“BULLDOG” CATTLE 
Niata Breed, Described by Darwin, Becoming Exceedingly Scarce—Presumed 
Mutation Accounts for Extraordinary Jaw and Face—Inheritance 
of Peculiarities Is Blended 
HE peculiar jaw characteristic of 
a bull-dog is a mutation which is 
not confined to the dog alone, but 
appears from time to time in 
other animals. It has been reported in 
foxes, and Charles Darwin found a whole 
race of cattle in South America which 
Showed this peculiarity. Writing of 
his trip through the province (now the 
department) of la Colonia in Uruguay, 
he said:! 
“On two occasions I met with in this 
province some oxen of a very curious 
breed called fiata or niata. They 
appear externally to hold nearly the 
same relation to other cattle which bull 
or pug dogs do to other dogs. Their 
forehead is very short and broad, with 
the nasal end turned up, and the upper 
lip much drawn back; their lower jaws 
project beyond the upper, and have a 
corresponding upward curve; hence 
their teeth are always exposed. Their 
nostrils are seated very high up and are 
very open; their eyes project outwards. 
When walking they carry their heads 
low, on a short neck; and their hinder 
legs are rather longer compared with 
the front legs than is usual. Their 
bare teeth, their short heads, and their 
upturned nostrils give them the most 
ludicrous self-confident air of defiance 
imaginable. 
“Since my return, I have procured a 
skeleton head through the kindness of 
my friend Capt. Sullivan, R. N., which 
is now desposited in the College of 
Surgeons. Don F. Muniz, of Luxan, 
has kindly collected for me all the 
information he can respecting this 
breed. From his account it seems that 
about eighty or ninety years ago they 
were rare and kept as curiosities at 
Buenos Aires. The breed is universally 
believed to have originated among the 
Indians southward of the Plata, and 
that it was with them the commonest 
kind. Even to this day, those reared 
in the provinces near the Plata show 
their less civilized origin, in being 
fiercer than common cattle, and in the 
cow easily deserting her first calf, if 
visited too often or molested. It is a 
singular fact that an almost similar 
structure to the abnormal one of the 
niata breed, characterizes, as I am 
informed by Dr. Falconer, that great 
extinct ruminant of India, the Siva- 
therium. The breed-is very true; anda 
miata bull and cow invariably produce 
niata calves. A niata bull with a 
common cow, or the reverse cross, 
produces offspring having an _ inter- 
mediate character, but with the niata 
characters strongly displayed; according 
to Senor Muniz, there is the clearest 
evidence, contrary to the common belief 
of agriculturists in analogous cases, 
that the niata cow when crossed with a 
common bull transmits her peculiarities 
more strongly than the niata bull when 
crossed with a common cow. When the 
pasture is tolerably long, the niata cattle 
feed with the tongue and palate as well 
as common cattle, but during the great 
droughts, when so many animals perish, 
the niata breed is under a great dis- 
advantage, and would be exterminated 
if not attended to; for the common 
cattle, like horses, are able just to keep 
alive by browsing with their lips on 
twigs of trees and reeds; this the niatas 
cannot so well do, as their lips do not 
join, and hence they are found to perish 
before the common cattle. This strikes. 
me as a good illustration of how little 
we are able to judge from the ordinary 
habits of life, on what circumstances, 
occurring only at long intervals, the 
1 Darwin, Charles, ‘‘Voyage of the Beagle,” p. 158 ff. New York, 1909. 
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