804 A HISTORY OF SHORT-HORN CATTLE. 



polled races of Scotland. The North-of -Scot- 

 land farmers were free buyers of Short-horn 

 bulls from such herds as those of Ury, Eden, 

 Shethin and Sittyton. Indeed the surprising 

 statement is made that not less than 1,000 bulls 

 of their own breeding were sold by the Messrs. 

 Cruickshank during a period of forty-seven 

 years for crossing purposes! This necessarily 

 wrought a wonderful improvement in the char- 

 acter of the farm cattle of Aberdeenshire and 

 adjacent counties, and Robert Bruce has favored 

 us with the following interesting statement as 

 to how the cattle-growers of those districts pro- 

 ceeded with the work of producing the "prime 

 Scot": 



Before the Short-horns found their way to the Northern 

 counties of Scotland the cattle there were nearly all black, a large 

 proportion of them heing polled. Between 1830 and 1840 Short- 

 horns began to be freely used by the ordinary farmers with the 

 result that there was improvement in the size over the native 

 stock. Along with increased size the cross-bred animals had the 

 valuable quality of maturing early in comparison with others. 

 The results of using a Short-horn bull with the native cows were 

 so satisfactory that for a considerable time this system of crossing 

 was considered the only safe and proper one. I can remember 

 well the effects of this belief all over the North of Scotland where 

 the farmers had gone on using Short-horn bulls on three, four, and 

 five generations of cows, grades from the original native polled 

 cows, till the large proportion of the stock in farmers' hands were 

 fairly passable Short-horns. At the time I refer to, from 1850 to 

 1860, 1 do not believe you could have found two Aberdeen- Angus 

 bulls serving in herds other than those that were pure-bred, and 

 so few pure-bred herds were there that it became impossible for 

 the ordinary farmers to get polled heifers to follow out what they 

 called the right system of crossing. 



I may whisper in your "lug" that it was about this time that 



