156 POLLED BREEDS 



of cattle as they are in different varieties of plants. It has often 

 seemed to me that, as regards utility points or characters or 

 aptitudes, F animals are apt to occur within the same breed. 

 This possibility might, with care, be tested while ascertaining 

 the relative qualities of the Galloway, the Shorthorn and their 

 cross-bred offspring the Blue-grey. 



The Red Poll. 



The only remaining polled breed that is bred in sufficient 

 numbers to be looked upon as commercial stock is included in 

 this chapter because of its hornless condition, and not because it 

 has any resemblance to the two polled breeds of Scotland. Nor is 

 it intended to countenance the vague speculations on the polled 

 condition now found in the East Anglian breed a breed which 

 to-day differs in many important respects from the Northern 

 cattle. Indeed, even this remote and ancient connexion which 

 is held to have had such important results as regards the carrying 

 of horns is not admitted by all authorities, and it is therefore 

 safer to say that the red cattle of Suffolk and Norfolk simply 

 resemble the Aberdeen Angus and the Galloway in being horn- 

 less and that there the resemblance begins and ends. 



Some years ago, not many generations, as cattle. lineage goes, it 

 would have been true to say that the Red Poll was par excellence a 

 dual-purpose breed. That one cannot say so now about all the 

 tribes or families composing the breed is due to certain dis- 

 tinguished breeders having determined to select their bulls and 

 cows with a view to beef-production to the neglect of milking 

 qualities. It is very difficult to understand what gain was to 

 be expected from this policy. There are surely many breeds as 

 good for the shambles as any Red Polls that have ever been 

 produced ; there is no evidence that the best specimens of Red 

 Polls were more economical in any way as beef-makers than 

 the general run, say, of the Aberdeen Angus or the Devons ; and 

 the former have never rivalled the outstanding stock from the 

 herds of the many recognized single-purpose beef varieties. On 

 the other hand, the dual-purpose animal is much less common, 

 is much more useful in intensive husbandry, such as ought to 

 be commonly practised in a thickly-populated country, and the 



