DUTEBENT BREEDS OF OXEN. 117 



that the herdsman has to watch the place and a favourable oppor- 

 tunity to castrate or spay them. They graze well, the young 

 ones getting into excellent condition in the summer. They lose 

 flesh in the winter, yet by the time they are killed towards the 

 close of the year, when four or five years old, they give very 

 good beef. The meat is finely marbled and well flavoured. 



In Wentworth Park, the chief seat of Earl Fitzwilliam, there 

 is a herd of very fine Indian cattle. They were presented to Lord 

 Rockingham by Mr. Verelst, who was at that time Governor of 

 Bengal. Their meat is not very pleasant to everyone's taste. 

 Some of the calves were castrated ; but they did not seem to 

 thrive so well as those that were left in their natural state. In 

 winter they are driven into a yard provided with sheds ; for they 

 would almost starve in the open ground. 



Another variety of cattle is met with in the Roman States. 

 These oxen are generally of a bluish ash colour, and they are 

 possessed of very large and spreading horns. 



A large white breed was for a long time kept in Egypt, and a 

 similar breed, devoid of the hump, characteristic of the Indian 

 ox, is met with in South x\frica, in which country, however, it 

 has become partially intermixed with European breeds. The 

 Kafirs, and, indeed, also the white inhabitants of South Africa, 

 employ oxen very extensively as beasts of burden, and in former 

 times they were even trained by the Hottentots to aid them in 

 battle. In fact, the intelligence of the South African ox may in 

 these cases even exceed that of the horse and even the sagacity 

 of the dog. Peter Kolben, in his account of the Cape of Good 

 Hope, written in the year 1705, gives a description of these 

 trained 6ghting oxen called backeleyers. It appears that their 

 oxen are the faithful servants and companions ot the Hottentots 

 — of whom not very many are now extant — the sharers alike of 

 their pleasures and of their fatigues. They are at once the 

 protectors and the servants of the Kafir, and help him to tend 

 his flocks and to guard them against invaders. While the sheep 

 are grazing, the faithful backely — so this kind of ox is designated 

 — stands and grazes beside them, and, attentive to the looks and 

 directions of its master, hastens now and again round the field, 

 keeping the straying sheep within their proper limits, and showing 

 not the lef St mercy to robbers nor even to harmless strangers 

 who may happen to be nigh at hand. Moreover, an army of 



