THE IRISH CATTLE INDUSTRY. 361 



farmers, as being better suited to the circumstances of the country, and more 

 capable of enduring hardship, and more easily subsisted.' " 



The views expressed by David Low about Kerries, nearly half a century 

 ago, are of special interest at the present time. He says : — 



" These cattle are hardy and capable of subsisting on scanty fare. Although 

 stunted in size when brought from the bogs and sterile pastures on which they 

 are reared, they make a wonderful advance in size, even though several years- 

 old, when supplied with suitable food. The fat of their beef is well mixed with 

 the muscular parts, or, in technical language, marbled ; and they fatten well in 

 the inside, a character which renders them valuable to the butcher, and 

 distinguishes them in a remarkable degree from the long-horned breeds of the 

 lower country. 



" But the peculiar value of the Kerry breed is the adaptation of the females 

 to the purposes of the domestic dairy. In milking properties the Kerry cow, 

 taking size into account, is equal, or superior, to any in the British Islands. 

 It is the large quantity of milk yielded by so small an animal which renders 

 the Kerry cow so generally valued by the cottagers and smaller tenants of 

 Ireland. She is frequently termed the poor man's cow, and she merits this 

 appellation by her capacity of subsisting on such fare as he has means to 

 supply. 



"This fine little breed has been greatly neglected ; scarce any means have 

 been used to produce a progressive development of form by supplying proper 

 nourishment to the breeding parents and the young, and no general care has- 

 been bestowed on preserving the purity of the stock. In almost every part of 

 Ireland, the breed has been crossed with the long-horns ; and a great 

 proportion of the cows of the country known under the name of Kerries are 

 the result of crosses of this kind, and have so deviated in a greater or lesser 

 degree from the native type, and almost always for the worse. 



" A few honourable exceptions, however, exist to this general neglect of 

 the mountain dairy breed of Ireland. One attempt has succeeded to such a 

 degree as to form a new breed, which partially exists with the characters com- 

 municated to it. It has been termed the Dexter breed. It was formed by the 

 late Mr. Dexter, agent to Maude Lord Hawarden. This gentleman is said to 

 have produced his curious breed by selection from the best of the mountain 

 cattle of the district. He communicated to it a remarkable roundness of form 

 and shortness of legs. The steps, however, by which the improvement was 

 effected have not been sufficiently recorded ; and some doubt may exist 

 whether the original was the pure Kerry, or some other breed proper to the 

 central parts of Ireland now unknown, or whether some foreign blood, as the 

 Dutch, was not mixed with the native race. One character of the Dexter 

 breed is frequently observed in certain cattle of Ireland, namely, short legs, 

 and a small space from the knee and hock to the hoofs. This has probably 

 given rise to a saying, sometimes heard, of ' Tipperary beef down to the heels. ^ 

 However the Dexter breed has been formed, it still retains its name and the 

 roundness and depth of carcase which distinguished it. When any individual 

 of a Kerry drove appears remarkably round and short-legged, it is common for 

 the country people to call it a Dexter. . . . The Kerry cows afford 

 admirable first crosses with Shorthorns, Herefords, and other large breeds. 

 Of these crosses, that with the Shorthorn is the most general, and appears tO' 

 be the best. The crosses are found well adapted to fattening as well as to 

 the dairy ; and the profit from this system is so Immediate, that it is to be 

 believed that it will be more largely resorted to than a progressive improve- 

 ment of the parent stock. 



