28 WILD WHITE CATTLE 



elephant, as may be gathered from the enormous dimensions 

 of a considerable variety of prehistoric skulls and other 

 remains dug up from time to time in many parts of the 

 United Kingdom, but not in Ireland. 



A collection of sixteen great skulls, not included in 

 Harting's comprehensive list (1880), is now in the Harris 

 Museum, Preston. It is a portion of an important find of 

 remains (mostly antlers of red deer) made while excavating 

 a dock near Preston (1884 to 1892). 



Plate IV. (a), of a characteristic Scottish specimen, shows 

 the sweep of the horns (which was round) and a part of the 

 concave forehead. The girth of the horn core close to the 

 root is here 13 inches, while, with hardly an exception, the 

 English specimens in the British Museum girth 17 to 18 inches. 

 This is an indication either that the wild bull of the North 

 was smaller than that of the South, or, more probably, that 

 the remains belonged to a later period, when the species 

 had degenerated and decreased in size, having taken a step 

 nearer the more modern progenitors of the wild white cattle. 



Another distinct species, the Bos longifrons, has been 

 misleadingly called the " Celtic Shorthorn." In almost every 

 characteristic, except that of the length of horn, it differed 

 from the modern animal to which the appellation is attached. 

 It possessed a small and slender form, and hair of a dark colour. 

 It is found to be the only domesticated bovine animal 

 before and up to the date of the Roman Conquest, when 

 Caesar reported the " number of cattle great." Its descend- 

 ants are now to be seen, after crossing to a greater or less 

 extent with the Bos urus, in the smaller British and Irish 

 breeds, for example, the Devon and the Kerry. Its remains 

 are numerous in Ireland, in the English fens, and other 

 places, always indicating domestication. 



Storer says of it : " The forehead, somewhat flat, has a 

 very prominent ridge standing up along the middle, and a 

 smaller, indenting backwards ; the horns are much flattened 

 and compressed, small, and directed outwardly upwards, and 

 bent in one direction forwards. From the slender make of its 

 bones, its body must rather have resembled that of a deer 

 than our common tame ox ; its legs at the extremities are 

 certainly shorter and also thinner than those of a crown deer 

 (full-antlered stag). The skull is long and narrow, even more 

 so than that of a deer. The rest of the skeleton is much like 



