60 PRINCIPLES OF RURAL ECONOMICS 



cattle in England, but they were said to be a nondescript, infe- 

 rior, and unprepossessing lot until Bakewell began breeding 

 them according to the principles of scientific selection. He vir- 

 tually created a new breed, the Leicesters, which, according to 

 Curtler, " in half a century spread over every part of the United 

 Kingdom, as well as to Europe and America, and gave England 

 two pounds of meat where she had one before." He set an ex- 

 ample and a standard for a multitude of followers, who have 

 made English mutton proverbial throughout the world. It is 

 pleasant to be able to state that Bakewell 's work was appreciated 

 in his own day ; he was visited by royal personages and by men 

 of distinction from all parts of the world. His breeding opera- 

 tions were highly profitable and his income from his animals 

 became very large for that day ; yet he died a poor man, largely 

 because of his unstinted hospitality and generosity. It was in 

 1760 that he began managing the estate at Dishley, where he 

 spent the rest of his life, dying in 1795. 



The Colling brothers and Shorthorn cattle. Next to Bakewell, 

 the Colling brothers did more than any others for the breeding 

 industry of Great Britain. Charles, the more successful of the 

 two, was born in 1751, and began his operations about 1770 at 

 Ketten, near Darlington, in the valley of the Tees, while his 

 brother established himself at Brampton. The real origin of the 

 modern Shorthorn is said to date from the purchase of the bull 

 calf Hubback by Charles Colling in 1785. The exact ancestry 

 of this remarkable animal is not definitely known, but it is pretty 

 certain that he had some Dutch blood. However, the cattle of the 

 valley of the Tees, sometimes called the Teeswater Durhams, 

 had long been known for their superior qualities, particularly as 

 milkers, but also for their size and beauty. Charles Colling 

 noticed Hubback running in the common pasture at Hornby. 

 He had been sold at the market, along with his mother, to a 

 blacksmith of Darlington, who in turn gave them to his daughter 



