150 



THE LANCASTER FARMER. 



[October, 



1 



GENERAL UTILITY OF SHORTHORNS. 



Their Origin--Pure Blood and Mixed Blood- 

 Management and Treatment. 



The accompanying engraving illustrates one 

 of the celebrated shortlioru bulls which stood 

 at the head of tlie great stock farm of Col. W. 

 S. King, at Lvndale, near Minneapolis. "Old 

 Sam " and the " Second Duke of Hillhurst," 

 were illustrated in previous numbers of The 

 Farmer. "Scotsman " was an imported bull 

 and stood at the head of the herd at Lyndale 

 before "Old Sam" assumed that position of 

 honor. He took many first prizes, and was re- 

 garded as a very tine animal. 



The London AyricuUuml Gazette of the 25th 

 lilt. , contains an elaborate paper on the General 

 Utilitv of Shorthorns, read before the North- 

 east [Somerset Farmers' Club, by Mr. E. A. 

 Fawcett, in which he thus jtreats of the origin 

 of Shorthorns : 



First of all, then, he would touch upon tlie 

 origin of Shorthorns. Their origin would be 

 some hundreds of years before the Herd Book 

 was comi)iled, therefore they would observe at 

 once with him the folly of arguing simply upon 

 the foundation of the Herd Book. For instance, 

 the Stan wick 

 Park herd was 

 said to have ex- 

 isted at least two 

 hundred years be- 

 fore Messrs. Col- 

 ling purchased 

 the cow called 

 Duchess, and 

 Messrs. Colling's 

 herds were sold 

 some ten or 

 twelve years be- 

 fore the Herd 

 Book was estab- 

 lished. He men- 

 tioned that, to 

 show them that 

 no breeder ought 

 to be guided sole- 

 ly by the pedi- 

 grees of the Herd 

 Book. Messrs. 

 Colling, who were 

 probably the first 

 parties who bred 

 the Shorthorns in 

 and in, purchased 

 from Messrs. 

 Maynard and 

 others, who had 

 been breeders of 

 Shorthorns long 

 before the 

 Messrs. Colling 

 started. No pedi- 

 grees were then 

 kept ; the Herd 

 Book only com^ 

 menced in the 



year 1822 or aljout then, and therefore the 

 early pedigrees, as found entered in the Herd 

 Book, were, necessarily, to a very large extent, 

 made up from hearsay, or, at best, from very 

 questionable information. People referred to 

 the Herd Book as though it related to the be- 

 ginning of the breed of Shorthorns, although 

 it was well known they had been known as the 

 Teeswater or Dutch cattle, for hundreds of 

 years before, but no exact account existed as 

 to their origin or the process by which they 

 were improved. No doubt the Galloways and 

 the West Highlanders were those which im- 

 proved the quality of the flesh and the hair, 

 reduced their size, sliortened their legs, and 

 increased the valuable pro]iortions as well as 

 the flavor of tlie tlesh. The Durham ox was 

 calved aliout the year ITiKi, was got by Favotn-- 

 ite (2o2), and was out of a black and white 

 cow, bought in Durham market for £14, some 

 twenty years before the Herd Book existed. 

 Messrs. Maynard, "Whitham, Charge, Harri- 

 son, Millbanks, and many others, were well- 

 known bull breeders long before that period. 

 Hubback, No. 31SI, was pointed out as the 

 foundation of the Shorthorn breed, but no one 



knew how he was bred. Mr. William Fawcett 

 had him, and used him long before the Col- 

 lings had him, and he believed that his dam 

 was a black Galloway cow, which went in the 

 lanes. He was sold for £1 to a Mr. Nattrass 

 when a calf (so it was said, ) but there was great 

 doubt as 10 this calf being the bull that was 

 afterwards called Hubback. Messrs. Colling 

 & Waistell gave £10 for him, and sold him to 

 C^harles Colling for £8, and Mr. Hubback 

 bought him from Charles Colling, hence he got 

 the name of Hubback. This bull died in 1791, 

 some tliirty years Ijefore the Herd Book was 

 compiled, and therefore they might judge how 

 ditlicult and uncertain it must have been, to 

 arrive at anything like the correct pedigree of 

 the animal. T^iere was no positive proof what- 

 ever of his breeding. He passed through the 

 hands of various persons who kept no record 

 of the breeding of their animals, who seldom 

 knew what cow tliey were from, or by. wliat 

 bull they were got — for bulls in those days 

 went, as he was sorry to bear many did in that 

 place, in the fields and often in the lanes. It 

 was iierfectly clear that Hubback didjiot origi- 

 nate the Sh("nthorns, which it was now gener- 

 ally stated he did. They must have existed 



SHORTHORN BULL SCOTSMAN. 



Ijefore to produce him, and as to his exact 

 breeding, no one knew what was the breeding 

 of his dam or sire; it was mere supposition or 

 imagination. Then, again. Favourite (2.52), 

 calved 171)4, died in 180S). (They would ob- 

 serve, again, that was about ten years before 

 the Herd Book was established.) He was not 

 from stock of Messrs. Colling'sbreeding, but de- 

 scended from a cow bred by Messrs. Maynard. 

 He was by Bolingbroke, No. 86, and bred by 

 Phoenix, by Foljanibe from Mr. Maynard's 

 Favourite, sold to Messrs. Colling for some- 

 thing like £:i(l, and Bolingbroke's stock was 

 said liy many old lireeders to have resembled 

 the HeretVini cattle very strongly indeed. They 

 had red bodies and white faces, white legs and 

 white hacks; and many of the old breeders lie- 

 lieve that the Herefords were used as a cross 

 in some of tlie early Shorthorn cattle. Some 

 of them went so far as to say they remembered 

 some bulls of that breed going with the cows 

 in Stanwick Park. It was well known that 

 Messrs. Colling crossed with the Red Gallo- 

 ways (viz.: Scotch cows without horns,) and 

 Mr. Richard Booth also used them for a cross; 

 and the Loughorns, if not the Herefords and 



Devons, were also used. Some of the early 

 Shorthorn cows were hornless, and some had 

 cock-horns, indeed, some of Messrs. Booth's 

 had cock-horns to this day. Milk, hair, .size, 

 and beef were the properties at which the early 

 breeders aimed, and were wliat they desired 

 and considered necessary. Now-a-days, pedi- 

 gree apiieared to give the value almost entirely. 

 Were gentlemen who gave these enormous sums 

 for particular pedigrees justified in so doing ? 

 Mr. Fawcett then discussed the questions of 

 " Pure Booth," " Pure Bates," " Gwynnes," 

 and other "fashionable lots, " in connection 

 with the herd liook, one of liis many striking 

 illustrations being tlie following: 



The Duke of Devonshire liad a sale on Sep- 

 temljer 9th, 1874, and a great many extraor- 

 dinary prices were given by the nobility, and 

 some middle class fanners who were beginning 

 to follow the examjile of those gentlemen who 

 gave such prices. He was not there to advise 

 those present to do so, for a particular pedi- 

 gree only — nothing of the kind; hut he was 

 there to tell them the truth, and nothing but 

 the truth. At the Duke of Devonshire's sale 

 tliere was one family called the Rose of Raby, 

 supposed to contain the best animals the Duke 



of Devonshire 

 had then. He 

 would tell them 

 the descent of 

 these animals, 

 and then they 

 should hear what 

 prices they real- 

 ized the other 

 day. The Rose of 

 Raby was bred 

 byMr. H. E. Sur- 

 tees, of Dane 

 End, near Ware, 

 H ertf ordshire, 

 and he was there 

 a short time be- 

 fore Mr. Surtees' 

 sale of April 30, 

 1862. There was 

 a little calf there 

 that was very 

 poorly. It was 

 very quiet, and 

 so ill that they 

 thought there 

 was nothing in 

 the world for it 

 but dying. He 

 said to the bailiff, 

 "If you can get 

 another man and 

 manage to hold 

 the calf up, we 

 will see if it is 

 strong enough to 

 suck the cow. If 

 it can manage to 

 suck the cow, it 

 may possibly 

 live." He fetched another man or two; they 

 got the poor creature to suck, and after suck- 

 ing a few minutes it sot a little strength. He 

 advised them to let it suck a cow often in the 

 day. They did so; the calf got better, and was 

 sold at the sale to a gentleman named Betts 

 (who had a good deal of money, but who was 

 not a farmer) for 86 gs., because it was a jiure 

 Bates. That calf passed from Mr. Betts into 

 the hands of the Duke of Devonsliire, and it 

 was called the Rose of Raby. The whole of 

 that fomily in the hands of the Duke of Devon- 

 sliire were" bred from that identical miseraiile 

 looking calf. Now, he -would tell them the 

 prices they realized in September, 1874, and 

 tliese were considered tlie best animals sold in 

 that sale. Lot ten sold for 2ri0gs. ; lot sixteen, 

 30.5 g.s. Another was sold for 150 gs., and lot 

 twenty-five was sold for 230 gs. They would, 

 therefore, observe that from a poor little mis- 

 erable calf, for- which none of the gentlemen 

 present would have given 5s. , had tliey seen it 

 as he saw it, had descended some of the best 

 animals in the possession of the Duke of 

 Devonshire, and which had realized such 

 prices. 



