BOS PRIMIGENIUS 13 



may have crossed with his contemporary Bos 

 longifrons, an animal about the size of a Kerry, 

 and that some of our cattle are descended from 

 the cross. Had such a cross taken place, cattle 

 skeletally intermediate between Bos longifrons 

 and Bos primigenius must have resulted ; but of 

 such there is no evidence ; and Bos longifrons has 

 remained essentially the same right through the 

 period when he was contemporary with Bos 

 primigenius down to the present time. 



It has also been maintained by those who 

 hold that the wild white cattle at least are 

 descended from Bos primigenius, that they have 

 deteriorated in size through confinement and 

 consequent in-breeding. This presumes that 

 they were giants at the time they were emparked. 

 Had they deteriorated, as we are asked to 

 believe, some of them in four or five centuries, 

 some of them in two, such a phenomenon would 

 not have escaped notice till the nineteenth 

 century. And surely, since some herds were 

 still at liberty centuries after others had been 

 emparked, the contrast in size between the bond 

 and the free would have been recorded had it 

 been there to record. Besides, what evidence 

 have we that cattle or any other polygamous 

 animals deteriorate in size through in-breeding ? 

 As for Caesar's Urus, Urochs, Aurox, Aurochs, 

 the primeval ancestral bull, the father of the race : 

 is it to be taken seriously ? Then, so must his 



