BREEDS 145 



know the breed are agreed, is so valuable an attribute that it 

 is worthy of investigation. No one, as far as I know, has ever 

 investigated the factors which allow the Sussex to thrive under 

 privations which might be fatal to cows of other breeds. 



This strength of constitution, however, has not of itself 

 sufficed to win the breed any general popularity. Those who 

 keep Sussex cattle are enthusiastic in their praise, but they are 

 few. In Sussex and the surrounding counties other breeds are 

 much more numerous. Neglect of the breed would be in- 

 telligible if it were ignored because of its want of milking 

 power, but this is not so. There is a vast area of good grazing 

 land on Pevensey Marsh that was till 1914 almost entirely 

 devoted to summer grazing for beef; but the stock to be found 

 on it were not of the Sussex, or local, breed; yet the adjacent 

 Romney Marsh, devoted to sheep, was populated almost ex- 

 clusively by flocks of the native variety. The absence of Sussex 

 cattle is all the more inexplicable when it is remembered that 

 there are a great number of farms on other geological formations 

 in that neighbourhood which before the war were under per- 

 manent grass only good enough for breeding store-stock. The 

 exposed position and damp nature of the land of these farms 

 would, one would have expected, have made them specially suit- 

 able for producing the local breed. Yet with Pevensey at their 

 doors the farmers who bred Sussex were the rare exception and 

 the store cattle on the rich pastures came as far afield as from 

 Herefordshire, Wales, and other equally distant places. When 

 one did see the exceptional sight of a bunch of Sussex on these 

 rich grass tracts they seemed to be doing quite as well as their 

 neighbours ; I never heard a complaint of them from those who 

 had tried them, and the whole position is still a mystery. 



The Sussex in one respect are especially good graziers. 

 Amongst most cattle, turned out to get fat on pasture, the keen 

 observer may see a good deal of picking and choosing. The 

 beasts will frequently lift their heads and move on till they find 

 a portion of the grass that particularly pleases their palate. If 

 considerable care is not taken, the field will soon become rough 

 and irregular in surface through patches of the coarse grasses 

 being left untouched and the shorter and sweeter herbage being 



M. * Io 



