CATTLE. 



Bos taurus domesticus. 



f 



PLATE III. SHORT HORNED BREED. 



THE animal which we are now about to describe, and 

 which zoologists have genenerally included in the family 

 of the ruminants, are fully equal to the wool-bearing tribes 

 in value and utility. The several species and various 

 races of oxen, in all countries, are most in the economy of 

 the inhabitants. They are used for labor, and even assist 

 in the wars of their masters. Their flesh affords nourish- 

 ment for the body, while their skin, hoofs, and horns, are 

 indispensable for the stronger articles of clothing, and in 

 the manufacture of many substances in daily use. In some 

 countries, they are so much esteemed, and their produce 

 of milk, cheese, and butter, so highly valued, that they are 

 never slaughtered except on the most extraordinary 

 occasions, and never used as an article of common or 

 general food. In other countries, they are only used for 

 the purposes of sacred offerings. In Egypt, the bull was 

 long considered a sacred animal ; and in the mythology of 

 the Hindus, the Holy Cattle' are cared for, and their 

 molestation punished with the most severe penalties. 



In almost all countries where oxen are employed, (and 

 this is over the largest portion of the civilized world,) the 

 varieties of the European domesticated races are almost 

 the only animals which are used few of the other species 

 having yet been found capable of being domesticated to 

 any extent, or easily reared in confinement. Wherever 

 the breeds may have originally arisen, or from what primi- 

 tive stock they may have sprung, as yet, remains in doubt r 



