THE NORSE CONTINGENT 47 



Scotland and also in Ireland. It will be necessary 

 to marshal some part of what is known about 

 each of these breeds seriatim. 



The Suffolk Duns. — Although Suffolk was 

 renowned for its dairy products four or five 

 centuries ago, we have no earlier description 

 of the Suffolk cow herself than one written in 

 1735. In 1586, Camden wrote that in Suffolk 

 ** They also make vast numbers of cheese, which, 

 to the great advantage of the inhabitants, are 

 carried into all parts of England, nay, into 

 Germany also, with France and Spain, as Panteleon 

 Medicus has told us, who scruples not to compare 

 them with those of Placentia both in colour and 

 taste ; " ^ and Speed wrote : " The commodities of 

 this Shire are many and great, whereof the 

 chiefest consist in Corn, in Cattle, Cloth, Pasturage, 

 Sea-Fish, and Fowle ; and as Abbo Floriescensis 

 hath depainted. This country is of green and 

 passing fresh hucy pleasantly replenished with 

 Orchards y Gardens , and Groves : thus he de- 

 scribed it above six hundred years since, and 

 now we find as he hath said ; to which we may 

 add their gain from the Pail ; " ^ but John Kirby 

 in his "Suffolk Traveller," published in 1735, 

 describes the cow herself as having **a clean 

 throat, with little dewlap, a snake head, thin 

 and short legs, the ribs springing well from the 



* Gibson's edition, 1750, p. 437. 



2 " Theatre of the Empire of Great Britain," 1676, page 33. 



