64 CATTLE SHORTHORNS 



race of descendants, but it is conspicuous in the individual. 

 Numbers of highly-bred barren cattle, exported to America 

 at low prices, have been found to conceive without difficulty 

 after the change. 



It may be safely asserted that nearly all the well-bred 

 Shorthorns which have become famous within the period of 

 which there is any written history 1 of the breed, have been 

 descended more or less directly from a few bulls. The 

 "Studley Bull" (626), calved in 1737, is one of the earliest 

 recorded of the famous sires that formed the foundation 

 stock of the improved Shorthorn. " He was red and white, 

 of wonderful girth and depth of fore quarters, very short, neat 

 frame, and light offal." But still more notable was his great- 

 great-grandson " Hubback," 2 the father of the improved 

 Shorthorn, and his much in-bred descendants " Favourite " 

 (252) and "Comet" (i 55). 3 



" Hubback " was a small yellow-red bull with some white ; 

 bred about 1777 by John Hunter, a bricklayer, who had as 

 a small farmer been a Shorthorn breeder. The mother was 

 also small but very handsome, "of fine symmetry, with a 

 nice touch, and fine, long mossy hair" qualities " Hubback" 

 inherited from her. But the Collings had, before realising 

 the greatness of his merit, parted with him at ten years 

 of age, in 1785, to Hubback, of North Seton, in Northumber- 

 land, by whose name he is known in history. 



In Animals and Plants under Domestication , Darwin says 

 of " Favourite " (a light roan dropped in 1793, who was himself 

 the offspring of a half-brother and sister from " Foljambe," and 

 said to be " a grand beast ") that he " was matched with 

 his own daughter, granddaughter, and great-granddaughter, 

 so that the produce of this last union, or the great-great- 

 granddaughter, had fifteen-sixteenths, or 93-75 per cent., of 

 the blood of * Favourite ' in her veins." 



1 George Culley, who wrote on the agriculture of Northumberland, 

 and also Observations on Live Stock, 1786, is one of the first historians 

 of the breed. He was an intimate friend and adviser of the Collings, 

 and an enthusiastic pupil of Bakewell. 



' 2 Sanders says : " It was at one time alleged that there was Kyloe 

 blood in * Hubback's ' veins on his dam's side, but this is not substantiated." 



3 These were all descended from " Studley Bull." " Comet " by 

 "Favourite" out of "Phoenix,", was sold at Chas. Colling's sale in 1810 

 for looo guineas. 



