Ill 



THE ROMAN CONTINGENT 



Although the opinion that the wild white cattle 

 were the untamed descendants of the mighty 

 Urus was at one time widely believed, there 

 grew up a body of dissenters, among whom 

 Owen,^ Boyd Dawkins,^ and Dr. J. A. Smith ^ 

 were notable, who were sceptical, first, of our 

 domestic cattle being descended from Bos primi- 

 genius ; next, of the wild white cattle being 

 descended from the same source ; and, lastly, of 

 these same wild white cattle being descended 

 from wild cattle at all. The views of the sceptics 

 were thus boldly expressed in Alston's ** Fauna 

 of Scotland," published in 1876: "To me the 

 evidence appears overwhelmingly to prove that 

 the modern park cattle are not wild survivors 

 of the Urus, but are the descendants of a race 

 which had escaped from domestication, and had 

 lived a feral life till they were enclosed in the 

 parks and chases of the mediaeval magnates." 



* " British Fossil Mammals and Birds." 



' " Cave Hunting," and " Early Man in Britain." 



3 " Notes on the Ancient Cattle of Scotland." 



35 



