220 WILD WHITE CATTLE. 



Ballads," and in Percy's "Keliques of Ancient 

 English Poetry,'' where we are informed that it was 

 entered on the Stationers' books in 1591, although 

 undoubtedly of much older date. Much of this 

 story, as Mr. Storer has observed, may be mythical, 

 and many of its circumstances fabulous ; but it 

 nevertheless seems to prove just as clearly the exist- 

 ence in very ancient times of the dangerous and 

 ferocious wild cow, as the popular ballads about 

 Robin Hood prove the existence of fallow deer in 

 Sherwood Forest in the time of King John.* 



In the Welsh laws of Howell Dha, which date 

 from about A.D. 940, or before the middle of the 

 loth century,t we find white cattle with red ears 

 (that is, resembling in colour the wild cattle of 

 Chillingham) ordered to be paid in compensation for 

 offences committed against the Princes of Wales. 

 It is a question, however, whether the description 

 indicates a difference of breed, or merely a difference 

 of colour in individuals of the ordinary breed of 

 Welsh cattle. 



In the forest laws of King Canute (A.D. i o 1 4- 1 03 5) , 

 wild cattle are thus referred to : " There are 

 also a great number of cattle which, although they 

 live within the limits of the forest, and are subject 

 to the charge and care of the middle sort of men, 



* See also Woods' remarks on this point in his " Description of a 

 Fossil Skull of an Ox found in Wiltshire," 4to, 1839. 



t An English translation of these laws will be found appended to 

 " The Myvyrian Archaeology of Wales collected out of Ancient Manu- 

 scripts," ed. Owen Jones and others (Denbigh, 1870), pp. 1014-1062. 

 Vide cap. ii. 3. 



