128 EVOLUTION OF BRITISH CATTLE 



arrival upon the scene we have been unable to 

 fix, produced brindles with both races — dark 

 brindles with the black natives and light brindles 

 with the Scandinavians. Here again, there being 

 no deception, or, at any rate, only a slight one, 

 for dark brindle is sometimes very nearly 

 black, we can understand how, when black 

 became the favoured colour, the brindles and 

 their blackish-brown parent would gradually 

 disappear. 



But other races intervened — the Anglo-Saxon 

 red race — whether openly and frankly in earlier 

 days, or, disguised in their partial progeny the 

 Longhorn, early in the eighteenth century ; the 

 Longhorns themselves, with their white finch- 

 backs and white underline ; and lastly, the 

 Dutch flecked race, first in the guise of Fife- 

 shire cattle,^ and, later on, as Shorthorns. 

 And these races left their marks, some to be 

 eliminated easily, others with difficulty. When 

 red cattle were bred with blackish-browns and 

 light duns, they produced brindles and yellows, 

 and these, being unwelcome, were bred out 

 quickly ; but, when bred with black cattle, they 

 produced black masqueraders. We can thus 

 understand why an occasional red calf turns up. 

 Masqueraders are difficult to deal with, and, 

 when two of them meet, there is one chance in 



» There is a probability that these cattle may have absorbed 

 Dutch blood direct from Holland before the Shorthorn invasion. 



