NORFOLK AND SUFFOLK RED POLLED CATTLE. 149 



The registered herds are thus distributed : 



InEngland 83 



In Ireland 1 



In Scotland 1 



United States of America 28 



Germany 1 



For this wide diffusion many thanks are due to the Royal 

 Agricultural Society of England, who of late years have given 

 separate classes and substantial prizes. At the Shrewsbury 

 Royal, 1884, the official reporter, Mr. William Housman (albeit 

 a Shorthorn man), thus writes in the journal of Red Polled 

 bulls : " Some very good and useful-looking bulls, level and 

 thick-fleshed, of rich colour, with the style which only carefully- 

 bred animals can possess, competed in the three classes. . . . 

 But the bull of the really highest style and character, the beau 

 ideal of a thorough-bred animal, is Mr. R. Harvey -Mason's 

 Napoleon, whose merit (although particulars of which the 

 butcher can take no cognisance, go to make a most attractive 

 appearance) consists mainly in properties which the most 

 practical man can appreciate. There is a frame of ample size, 

 not overgrown, truly moulded, moulded to the most perfect 

 proportion of each part to the whole ; straight limbs set on in 

 the right places, and the joints most beautifully turned ; the 

 hocks are especially straight and neat, and the short tapering 

 of the ends of the massive thighs to the hocks, with flesh as far 

 as flesh can go, and then no lumber, but a nice clean joint, make 

 quite a pattern of refined form. The touch discovers a rich 

 layer of lean flesh, spread everywhere evenly, and the hair is of 

 the richest red, deep in colour, but not blackened. The head is 

 gay and full of life ; the neck (a most expressive feature in- a 

 bull, if the term may be allowed, as his way of using it tells his 

 character) is sufficiently substantial without coarseness, and 

 extra arched, with a bridling side-way half turn of the head on 

 the approach of a stranger. Vigorous life, not nice, appears in 

 this instant consciousness of notice." 



The bull thus so eulogistically and faithfully described, was 

 at the time about eighteen months old, but did not subsequently 

 distinguish himself in the show yard, Mr. Harvey-Mason having 



