30,8 COMMON ox. 



who spend their whole lives in rearing and guard- 

 ing them from injuries, are debarred from enjoying 

 the fruits of their labour. They are denied the 

 use of flesh, and are obliged, by their condition, or 

 rather by the cruelty of the opulent, to live, like 

 horses, upon barley, oats, coarse pot-herbs, &c." 



" The British breed of horned cattle has," says 

 Mr. Pennant, " been so much improved by a fo- 

 reign mixture, that it is difficult to point out 

 the original kind of these islands. Those which 

 may be supposed to have been purely British, 

 are far inferior in size to those of the northern 

 parts of the continent. The cattle of the high 

 lands of Scotland arc exceedingly small ; and 

 many of them, males as well as females, are horn- 

 less. The Welch runts are much larger : the 

 black cattle of Cornwall are of the same size 

 with the last. The large kind that is now cul- 

 tivated throughout most parts of Great Britain, 

 are either entirely of foreign extraction, or our 

 own improved by a cross with the foreign kind. 

 The Lincolnshire kind derive their size from the 

 Holstein breed ; and the large hornless cattle that 

 are bred in some parts of England came origi- 

 nally from Poland*." 



In his Natural History of this animal, the 

 Count de Buffon is well known to have fallen 

 into a very extraordinary error, viz. in affirming 

 that at the age of three years, the Bull and Cow 

 cast their horns, which are replaced by others 



* Brit. Zool. 



