180 THE CATTLE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



summer and winter under circumstances in which the smoother 

 coated and softer southern breeds would pine or perish. High- 

 land cattle are easily fed, and the quality of the beef is 

 admittedly superior, and consequently in great demand ; and a 

 score or two of splendid three-year-old Highland oxen are n,o 

 unusual feature in a noble English park, which they adorn when 

 in life, and at the owner's table they are no less appreciated 

 when they appear as roast beef at Christmastide, for, like 

 Goldsmith's venison, 



Finer or fatter 



Ne'er roamed in a forest 



Nor smoked on a platter. 



The objection to Highland cattle as compared with the 

 southern breeds is, that they do not mature so early, and that 

 therefore there is not in them the same quick return of capital, 

 and the objection is so far perfectly sound. A Lowland farmer 

 therefore finds it more profitable to breed shorthorns, polled, or 

 cross cattle ; but the Highland farmer rears his Highland cattle 

 at little or no expense beyond the value of the hill or rough 

 natural pasture on which they are kept in summer, and of such 

 meadow hay or straw as they get in winter, and he is thus 

 enabled to sell them at a paying price at the age of six quarters, 

 or two years, to the southern farmer or dealer, who buys them 

 and carries them on to profit until they are prime fat for the 

 butcher. They are not, however, so well adapted for court or 

 yard keep as for the open field, or for tying up, and that is a 

 disadvantage. 



The characteristic appearance of this breed of cattle is well 

 known. A well-bred animal of almost any species is a pleasing 

 object to behold, but there are perhaps few animals familiarly 

 known to us so graceful in form and movement, and so pic- 

 turesque in colour and coat, as a thoroughly well-bred and 

 well-conditioned Highland steer or heifer in its free condition. 

 In form it possesses all the points so much and so justly prized 

 in the shorthorn — the straight back, the short, straight legs 

 set well apart, the broad chest, the breadth of loin, the well- 

 sprung and deep rib — in short, the squareness and solidity of 

 form which imply strength and weight whether in man or 

 beast, while the nobly branching horns, widely sprung from a 



