584 A HISTORY OF SHORT-HORN CATTLE. 



is indeed not recorded that he ever spoke ill of 

 any man. Given little to speech it was with 

 difficulty that even his best friends could draw 

 him out. The house in which he lived and 

 died at Sittyton was a modest one, as befitted 

 the character of its tenant. He was very fond 

 of his shrubbery, vines and flowers, and here, 

 far removed from "the madding crowd," he 

 worked out in his own original way the great 

 problem that confronted the cattle-growers of 

 his time in the North of Scotland. 



The farm of Sittyton. The farm upon which 

 the Messrs. Cruickshank began their breeding 

 operations is situated about twelve miles north- 

 west of the granite city of Aberdeen. From 

 the roadway leading to this, the foremost nur- 

 sery of Scotch-bred Short-horns, one may catch 

 upon the east glimpses of the German Ocean 

 and toward the west, when the air is clear, the 

 outlines of the distant Grampians. It consists 

 of about two hundred and sixty acres, consti- 

 tuting a part of the estate known as Straloch, 

 It has no natural advantages adapting it to 

 successful cattle-breeding from the standpoint 

 of those accustomed to the fertile and well- 

 sheltered farms abounding everywhere in Eng- 

 land and America. When Amos Cruickshank 

 took possession in 1837, at the age of twenty- 

 nine years, the land was in poor condition and 

 stood greatly in need of buildings, as well as 



