PART I 



BREEDS OF CATTLE 



LECTURE NO. i. 



ORIGIN OF THE DOMESTICATED RACES OF CATTLE. 



I. Reliable information regarding the differ- 

 ent races of cattle is very meager until we reach the 

 seventeenth century, owing 



(1) To the very partial references made to them by his- 

 torians before that time, and 



(2) To the imperfect nature of the sketches made by 

 artists, so far as these have been handed down to us. 



II. It is noteworthy that the first shepherd and 

 the first farmer were cotemporaneous. 



(1) Likewise the keeping of live stock and grain growing 

 have gone hand in hand through all the centuries wherever 

 agriculture has been distinctively progressive. 



(2) The exceptions are mountainous and infertile dis- 

 tricts, and those with a great abundance of fertility. 



(3) The comparatively unimproved condition of the live 

 stock interest is to-day the weakest point in American 

 agriculture. 



III. The term cattle is applied to the various 

 races of domesticated animals belonging to the genus 

 Bos the ox. 



(1) It belongs to the class Mammalia, the order Ruminan- 

 tia, and the family Bovidae and comprises two primary groups, 

 viz: The Bos indicus and Bos taurus. 



(2) The sub-genus, Bos indicus, includes the zebus or 

 humped cattle numerously found in some parts of Asia and 



^Africa. 



I 



