OHAPTEE VI 



SHORTHORNS. 



By JOHN THOENTON, 



EDITOK OF "THE SHOKTHOEN CIRCULAE." 



[HE SHOETHOEN BEEED OF CATTLE may now 



be fairly called cosmopolitan. Its "habitat" is 

 everywhere. From one small spot in Britain, its 

 native home, it spread through this country till it is 

 found from John o'Groat's to Land's End; in Ireland it prevails 

 everywhere ; to most parts of the globe it has emigrated ; and 

 an importation of animals by the Government of Japan shows 

 that even the exclusive East is ready to accept the breed as an 

 imprint for the native races. 



The "art and mystery" of breeding has worked marvels upon 

 our native breeds of cattle ; and the modelling powers of man 

 have been so exercised upon Shorthorns that the gaunt, ungainly 

 form, which seems once to have characterised the race has 

 been fashioned into a parallelogram of symmetry and beauty. 

 There seems little doubt that, from time immemorial, the breed 

 existed, as a local type, along the rich grazing valleys of the 

 Tees ; in the counties of Durham and Yorkshire. Noblemen 

 and squires, with a thoroughly English love of good stock, kept 

 up the herds, on their estates, with as much pride as their own 

 j)edigrees. Numerous are the local records of the excellences 

 and feeding properties of these cattle ; and of their capability 

 of attaining enormous weight when at full maturity. Mr. Chas. 

 Colling, of Ketton, County Durham — (a follower of the great 

 Bakewell, and a man of great judgment and sagacity) — was the 

 first to fix national attention upon the merits of the breed. 



