38 BRITISH DAIRYING. 



always selling. Pedigree herds are the " upper ten " of bovine 

 society, and dairy farmers who are in business for profit, and 

 not for a hobby, cannot afford to have much to do with them. 

 Indeed, pedigree bulls are sometimes a delusion and a snare 

 when brought into an ordinary herd. I have known two 

 marked instances of this. One of these bulls got very few calves, 

 and those not very good ones; the other got plenty too many, 

 in fact and scarcely any of them were equal to their mothers. 

 This last one, indeed, very seriously lowered the quality of a 

 high-class, non-pedigree herd, which belonged to an old friend 

 of mine who is now gathered to his fathers. 



But, on the other hand, I have known a case where a 

 pedigree bull had qualities so marked and commanding that 

 his impress was clearly enough seen for many generations 

 among the cattle of the neighbourhood. All this is a lottery, 

 as matrimony is said to be. It would, however, be much 

 less a lottery if those who buy bulls, be they pedigree or not, 

 would take sufficient pains to assure themselves that the quali- 

 ties they want in the bulls are hereditary, and not merely acci- 

 dental. In order that the bull may improve the herd, he must 

 needs come of a family which has long been noted for sound- 

 ness and vigour of constitution ; otherwise he will not influence 

 the offspring very much to their advantage. But if he possess 

 that strength, and soundness, and vigour, his influence will be 

 seen in many generations. This, indeed, is prepotency, and 

 it comes, like other functions, within the meaning of heredity. 



Crossing. 



The offspring of a cross between two animals of the same 

 breed, but not of the same family or even related in blood, is 

 generally strong and vigorous, sometimes more so than either 

 of the parents ; whereas, on the other hand, close in-breeding 

 tends towards delicacy of the constitution and weakness of 

 some of the functions. From this latter condition of things it 

 is easy to develop the disease known as tuberculosis. This, 

 however, is not exactly " crossing," in the ordinary acceptation 



