BOS PRIMIGENIUS 7 



enough — the whole herd were alarmed, and, 

 coming to its rescue, obliged him to retire ; for 

 the dams will allow no persons to touch their 

 calves, without attacking them with impetuous 

 ferocity." 



The next step was longer, but it was none 

 the less obvious. It was to the wild cattle 

 roaming the forest in unstinted freedom before 

 the Norman barons or their successors took to 

 enclosing parks for the preservation of game. 

 Mediaeval conditions lingered longest in some 

 parts of Scotland, and thence about 1526 from 

 the pen of Hector Boece, came the picture that 

 fascinated the imagination and indicated the 

 path to be followed if the ancestors of the wild 

 white cattle were to be found. 



"At this toun began the grit wod of Calidon.^ 

 This wod of Calidon ran fra Striveling, throw 

 Menteith and Stratherne, to Atholl and Loch- 

 quabir, as Ptolome writtis in his first table. In 

 this wod wes sum time quhit bullis, with crisp 

 and curland mane, like feirs lionis, and thoucht 

 they semit meek and tame in the remanent 

 figure of thair bodyis, thay wer mair wild than 

 ony uthir beistis, and had sic hatrent aganis the 

 societe and cumpany of men, that thay come 

 nevir in the wodis, nor lesuris quhair thay fand 

 ony feit or haind thairof, any mony dayis eftir, 



* Bellenden's translation. See Low's " Domesticated Animals," 

 P- 234- 



