10 AGRICULTURE. 



male having the same characteristics. If the produce 

 should be chestnut, with a bald face, and what the dealers 

 call white stockings, we can assure him of sympathy from 

 many fellow sufferers. To disappointments of this class 

 the proprietors of original, or very old, races are less liable. 

 Every connoisseur in cattle is aware, that, in a drove of 

 short-horned bullocks or heifers, there will be more diver- 

 sity of shape, of quality, of colour, and of aspect, than 

 in a corresponding drove of West Highlanders, Devons, or 

 Herefords. Another difficulty besets the breeders of short- 

 horns, and all others who have attained to animals of great 

 merit by many mixings and crossings. You have selected 

 the breeding stock for size, symmetry, propensity to fatten, 

 or for what a Frenchman would call a " je ne sais quoi;" 

 and a breeder, a sparky appearance. When you have se- 

 cured the recurrence of these qualities in their offspring, 

 as far as bovine frailty permits, you have invariably attained 

 this object at some sacrifice of fertility. We have known 

 some breeders of short-horns who have been, and perhaps 

 still may be, desirous of having bulls with the heads of 

 heifers and the thighs of bullocks. The offspring of such 

 males is always deficient in quantity, and is of weak con- 

 stitution ; the progeny inherits the paternal effeminacy. 

 When such a blunder has established itself in a herd, it 

 can only be redeemed by recurrence to a male, 



" cui turpe caput, cui plurima cervix, 

 Et crurum teuus a mento palearia pendent." 



These are the true and natural indications of taurility. 



Our lamented friend, Mr. Edge of Strelley, having 

 shaped in his imagination a breed of cattle formed on his 

 own model, great size, symmetry, and a propensity to 

 fatten, spared no expense to realize his vision. Aided by 

 a most correct eye, and with no prejudices, personal or 

 local, he selected at any cost, and from any quarter in 

 which he found them, the animals, both male and female", 

 which he thought likely to answer his expectations. Nor 

 was he disappointed in the qualities of their offspring. 



