CATTLE AND SHEEP. 37 



In our estimation, no man ever became an eminent breeder 

 without possessing many very valuable mental qualities 

 the power of accurately observing matters both important 

 and minute, and of appreciating their value -judgment and 

 decision perseverance and another quality still more 

 valuable than these, self-reliance. 



Having travelled so far with our mute companions, we 

 must say a few words on their more immediate preparation 

 for the final stage in their career. 



Of cattle made fat on natural pasture little need be said. 

 No doubt a grazier, to be successful, must exercise consi- 

 derable judgment in the selection of animals, and must 

 discern with an experienced eye when his land is stocked 

 to the exact point at which it will give the greatest produce. 

 We have heard it said of one old gentleman, that he could 

 tell when there was half a bullock too much or too little in 

 one of his hundred-acre fields. A very small proportion of the 

 grass land in England will, unassisted, turn out animals of 

 the degree of fatness which is required by modern customers, 

 and a still smaller proportion in other countries. Such 

 lands, however, do exist about Boston and other fen-land 

 vicinities in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire ; sparingly on the 

 alluvial borders of some of our principal rivers, and in the 

 vales of Belvoir, Aylesbury, and Evesham. Equal, perhaps, 

 to any of these, and far above their average, are the splendid 

 upland pastures which are found in Burton, Great Bowden, 

 and other townships in Leicestershire (many of which our 

 fox-hunting friends overlook, with an enthusiasm not purely 

 agricultural, from Carlton Clump near Kilworth Beau- 

 champ), in Braybrooke and Fawsley in Northamptonshire, 

 and in Lidliugton and another township, of which we forget 

 the name, in Rutland. Nor must we omit the celebrated 

 hundred-acre field at Cestus Over, of which local tradition 

 sayeth, that, on a fine showery day in May, the farmer laid 

 down his stick on a bare spot, and, being hastily summoned 

 home by his dinner-bell, left the stick behind him. After 

 his dinner he smoked only one pipe, and, returning straight 



