PROGRESS IN THE CENTRAL WEST. 369 



that during a whole fail campaign of State and 

 county fairs (including St. Louis) was never 

 beaten, taking sixteen first prizes and we be- 

 lieve every time by a unanimous vote of the 

 awarding committee in rings where there 

 were often twenty or more competitors. It is 

 idle to attempt to say which were most uni- 

 formly good of the get of Gen. Grant his bulls 

 or his heifers. Mr. Spears was never able to 

 decide, and Mr. McMillan often said, after the 

 bull came West, that for uniformity of breed- 

 ing he had never known the General's equal. 

 He died at Mr. Spears' Forest Hill Farm at the 

 ripe age of fourteen years. 



Baron Booth of Lancaster. We now have 

 to note an epoch-marking event. Mr. Pickrell 

 had parted with Sweepstakes and Spears w r as 

 triumphant with Gen. Grant. The desire to 

 gain honors in the show-ring now asserted itself 

 actively throughout the West. Leaders in the 

 trade sought in ever direction for heavy show- 

 yard timber. While the Kentucky and Ohio- 

 bred cattle and their descendants were con- 

 tending among themselves for the mastery in 

 the Ohio and Mississippi Valleys Hon. M. H. 

 Cochrane of Hillhurst, Can., began a series 

 of importations destined to produce marked 

 changes in the prevailing channels of trade. 

 In 1867 his agent, that fine judge of a good 

 Short-horn, the late Simon Beattie, selected 



84 



