WORCESTER SOCIETY. 189 



with what first came to hand. The result was a progeny of 

 all colors, sizes and shapes, with no distinctive trait, and much 

 inferior to the original stock. We have to-day seen chance 

 cows and oxen, which would favorably compare with those im- 

 ported. But they are chance. Their ancestors may have been, 

 and their descendants may be unfit to be kept, and more unfit 

 to be killed. 



The oxen owned by Nathaniel Dodge, of Sutton, and which 

 have graced our shows for five years past, winning in one or 

 another class a sequence of our highest prizes, have never to 

 our knowledge been excelled. They were a cross from the old 

 Sutton stock and a breed known as the Holderness, and 

 weighed last February 4200 pounds live weight, and 4035 

 pounds slaughtered, being then five years and nine months old. 



For many years Princeton was as famous for handsome and 

 good cows as Sutton for its Working Oxen. And Princeton 

 derived its advantages in this respect from a judicious crossing 

 of the Holderness with the best animals of native breed. 

 Through the munificence of the Massachusetts Society for 

 promoting Agriculture, the farmers of Princeton and Sutton 

 have it in their power to restore their former reputation. The 

 North Devon bull Roebuck commends himself especially to 

 the competitor with working oxen. While in McGregor, the 

 descendant of one of the first milkers, of a breed (the Ayr- 

 shire) unequalled in that quality, the dairymen of the county 

 will find all they can desire. 



As successive years roll on we may well hope that our exhi- 

 bitions will show the true value of these animals. Crossed 

 with our best cows, may we not hope at length to establish 

 among ourselves a distinct breed, and that hereafter, instead of 

 a Princeton cow of a " mixed breed," or a Sutton ox from a 

 blue bull, we may take pride in writing upon our own "cards" 

 and showing to strangers on our hills, in the yoke or at the milk 

 pail, the beautiful form of the Worcestershire breed of cattle. 



H. H. KEITH, Chairman. 



