58 A FARMER'S YEAR 



and pick up what food they can, which is not much. This 

 morning I was watching their behaviour to one of their number 

 that, for domestic reasons, had been in seclusion for about a 

 fortnight. Now she reappeared for the first time, and, forgetful of 

 her calf, which no doubt had been removed from her a week or so 

 before, testified her joy at finding herself in the open air again by 

 gambolling about the field with the awkwardness peculiar to the 

 race, kicking up her heels and lowing. The strange point of the 

 performance was that the other cows were much annoyed at her 

 appearance, for every one of them, as they found a chance, butted 

 her and knocked her about in a fashion which made me glad that 

 the breed is hornless. Clearly the memory of cows is short. This 

 sister of theirs had been separated from them for a few days, 

 therefore they treated her as an intruder, a slight which she 

 seemed to resent, for whenever she could spare time from her 

 gambols she gave her last assailant battle, pushing at it with her 

 head till one or the other got the better of the war. This 

 cow-play went on for twenty minutes or more, when it was given 

 up apparently by mutual consent, and the stranger, as it were, 

 readmitted into the fellowship of the herd with all the rights and 

 privileges thereto pertaining. 



Here I may as well explain that my cows, of which I keep 

 about twenty at the Home Farm in Ditchingham, are all regis- 

 tered pedigree animals of the Norfolk red-poll breed, that as yet is 

 not so well known throughout Great Britain as it deserves to be. 

 Looked at with the most critical eye it cannot be doubted that 

 red-polls have many advantages, though, of course, there may be 

 other tribes which have even more. To begin with, their looks are 

 in their favour. What can be more beautiful than the appearance 

 of a herd of these bronze-red, shining-coated cattle as they 

 wander over a pasture in the summer, or stand chewing their cud 

 in the cool shadow of the trees, gazing at the intruder with wide- 

 opened, sleepy eyes ? Indeed, so fine are their limbs, and, espe- 

 cially in the case of the young things, so deer-like their heads, 

 that they might almost be taken for wild creatures which know not 



