SWEDISH WHITE POLLS 155 



Lofft shows that early in the nineteenth century " two herds 

 of these cattle existed in Suffolk that had quite escaped the 

 observation of the historian of the breed" the Rev. John 

 Storer. 1 In support of his statement he drew attention to a 

 picture by the elder Ward who painted in the eighteenth 

 century of " a large landscape in the National Gallery, 

 Trafalgar Square, where stands in the foreground a grand 

 White Polled bull with red ears ; and in the same gallery 

 another picture, much smaller, of a white bull with red ears " ; 

 adding, " I have myself two pictures of this master, in one of 

 which is a White Polled cow, in the other a W T hite Horned 

 cow, both with red ears " ; from which he inferred that " stock 

 of this sort was spread over the country to a much greater 

 extent than writers of that period would lead us to suppose." 



Two cows and a heifer were secured at Troston Hall sale, 

 by V. P. Lort, for the Home Farm at Vaynol Park. They 

 were not hardy, and were disposed of. They were crossed by 

 the wild white bull ; but the experiment was unsatisfactory, 

 the offspring proving unsound. A small herd existed, from 

 1895 to 1902, on the estate of the Hon. W. F. D. Smith, M.P., 

 of Great Thurlow, Suffolk. At the Troston Hall sale four cows 

 and a young bull were secured to form it ; but the cows did 

 not prove to be good butter-makers, and at the end of seven 

 years they were crossed with a Shorthorn, and no further 

 attempt was made to retain them as a herd. 



Storer clearly indicates the probability of the existence of 

 an ancient white breed of domestic cattle in Norfolk and 

 Suffolk at this early date, and refers to the " gigantic stature " 

 of its presumed descendants, which stood 6 feet high, and to 

 the extraordinary power of certain cows of the breed to 

 perpetuate their characteristics for generations, even when 

 mated with Shorthorn and other bulls. The equally ancient 

 Swedish Fieldra breed of white polled cattle are in shape and 

 colour-markings indistinguishable from many of our white 

 polled cattle of to-day, and it is open to conjecture that the 

 two breeds had a common origin. (See Appendix I.) 



here in procession through the principal streets of the town to the Church 

 of St Edmunds. This relic of Druidism prevailed here even to the 

 Reformation." From Tymms' Handbook of Bury St Edmunds. 



1 Probably Lofft overlooked Storer's reference, made at page 317, to 

 the Brook House Stock, owned by Sir Roger Kerrison. 



