194 AGKICULTUKAL REPORT. 



It has also been iutroduccd into tlie United States and tlie British provinces 

 of North America, and, at the present time, is probably more extensively kept 

 as a dairy breed than any other in the world. 



Importations of Ayrshire cattle into this country were made upwards of 

 twenty years ago, but the animals were neither numerous nor generally in the 

 hands of persons who took much pains to increase them. It was not, thercfoi-e, 

 until a comparatively late day that the Ayrshires were much known here, or 

 that specimens were sufficiently numerous to indicate the permanent establish- 

 ment of the breed in this country. 



A few remarks in regard to the origin of this valuable breed of cattle, in con- 

 nexion with their comparative value for dairy purposes, may not be out of place. 

 It is evident that the modern Ayrshire breed presents a wide contrast to that 

 which occujiied the western portion of Scotland many years ago. 



Alton, in his " Dairy Husbandry," speaks of the cattle which occupied Ayr- 

 shire fifty years before the time, when he wrote (180G) as follows : " The cows 

 kept in the districts of Kyle and Cunningham (districts of Ayrshire) were of a 

 diminutive size, ill-fed, ill-shaped, and yielded but a scanty return in milk ; 

 they were mostly of a black color, with stripes of white along the chine or ridge 

 of their backs, about their flanks, and on their faces ; their horns were high 

 and crooked ; their pile (hair) was coarse and open, and few of them yielded 

 more than three or four Scotch pints (six to eight wine quarts) of milk a day. 

 A comparison of these points with those presented by the present breed of 

 Ayi'shire cattle renders probable the conclusion of Youatt, that the present 

 stock could not have arisen entirely from the old. It follows, therefore, that 

 the modern breed, like various other valuable breeds of domestic animals, origi- 

 nated in crossing. The question as to the breeds from which it was derived 

 will be briefly considered. 



Various accounts represent that the Earl of Marchmont, some time between 

 1724 and 1740, introduced to his estates in Berwickshire some cattle, conjec- 

 tured (their history was not positively known) to be of the Holderness or Tees- 

 water breed, and that not long afterwards some of the stock was carried la 

 astates belonging to the same nobleman in that part of Ayrshire called Kyle. 

 But it is not improbable that the chief nucleus of the improved breed was the 

 " Dunlop stock," so-called, which appears to have been possessed by a distin- 

 guished family by the name of Dunlop, in the Cunningham district of Ayrshini, 

 as early as 1780. This stock was derived, at least in part, from animals im- 

 ported from Holland. 



The Dunlop cows soon became noted. Rawlin, (as quoted by Youatt.) who 

 wrote in 1794, speaking of the cattle of Ayrshire, says : "They have another 

 breed, called the Dunlop, which are allowed to be the best race for yielding 

 milk in Great Britain or Ireland, not only for large quantities, but also for rich- 

 ness and quality." This, though perhaps extravagant praise, bIioavs that the 

 stock possessed remarkable properties at that early day. It was, indeed, held 

 in great esteem still earlier. In Youatt's " Treatise" it is mentioned, when 

 speaking of the cattle of Dumfriesshire, that the poet Burns, when he occupied 

 a fann near the city of Dumfries, not content with the Galloway breed, intro- 

 duced some of the west country cows, which he thought would produce more 

 milk. In the poet's published correspondence allusion is made, in a letter dated 

 November 13, 1788, to a heifer -vfhich had been presented to him by the pro- 

 prietor of Dunlop house as " the finest quey in Ayrshire." Mrs. Dunlop, it 

 will be recollected, Avas a special friend and correspondent of the poet. 



As a further explanation of the preference given by Burns for the " west 

 country cows," it maybe mentioned that the writer, when visiting Scotland for 

 the purchase of Ayrshire cattle in the year 1858, had several interviews with 

 the poet's sister, the late Mrs. Begg, of Ayr, in one of which she stated that 

 her brother, during his occupancy of the fann of Ellisland, near Dumfries, "kept 



