THE IMPROVED BREED 191 



imported breed, which gives greater variety of colour and a 

 greater admixture of white. During subsequent selection, 

 carried on with the main object of increased milk production, 

 it is most natural to suppose that the animals possessing large 

 proportions of new blood would be favoured and preserved 

 on account of form, size, and good milking qualities ; and 

 that along with these would be associated the tendency to 

 whiteness, a correlated original attribute of the imported blood. 

 The fashion for the light colour, small teats, and heavy fore 

 quarters in showyard animals, has developed much since 

 Lawrence Drew of Merryton took the first prize for an Ayr- 

 shire cow in milk with " Collyhill," at the Highland Society's 

 Show in Edinburgh in 1859. This cow also took the first 

 prize for an Ayrshire in milk at the Royal Agricultural 

 Society's International Show at Battersea in 1862, and a 

 painting of her by Gourlay Steel, the property of the High- 

 land Society at 3 George IV. Bridge, Edinburgh, formed 

 the original of the frontispiece in Vol. I. of The Ayrshire 

 Herd Book (Plate LXVI.). " Burnhouse " (No. 8), though 

 a brown bull, was the progenitor of many white prize-winners. 

 The Improved Ayrshire of the early part of last century 

 is thus described in probably the oldest record : 



" Their colours vary from a dark brown to different shades 

 of red, and some are approaching a cream colour. The head 

 and horns are fine, some strong near the head and wide 

 apart, the eye bright but mild. They have a fine neck with 

 little dewlap, are round and straight in the barrel, and free 

 from disposition to rise in the backbone, light in the upper 

 part of the shoulder, flat and wide in the loin and space 

 between the hips, with a capacious udder extending well both 

 forward and behind, and broad, held well up to the body, 

 with teats standing much apart and not of great length, 

 having good-sized milk veins ; the tail long and light, the 

 skin soft, having fine woolly hair, and legs short, with fine 

 bone and firm joints. They yield a large return in proportion 

 to the food they require ; they easily fatten their calves. 

 Their produce of milk varies from one thousand gallons in 

 one year, when in their best condition, down to seven or 

 eight hundred gallons when not at their best, each twenty- 

 eight to thirty gallons making twenty-four pounds of cheese. 

 Their usual yield of butter is a pound and a half to three 

 and a half to four gallons of milk, according to the feed 

 they get. They will do well on pastures that could not 



