THE ZEBU 297 



thick hides and shaggy black or brown coats. They are 

 grazed largely in the Western Highlands and fattened in the 

 South. They yield beef of the finest quality. Welsh cattle 

 are as hardy as the Highland, thriving on poor mountain 

 pastures ; they are mostly black, and the horns are rather 

 long. There are also polled or hornless cattle, of which the 

 Red Suffolk is one of the best examples ; it is a valuable 

 breed, hardy and a wonderful milker. The Alderneys and 

 Jerseys are small animals of practically little use to the 

 butcher, but they yield the richest yellow cream and butter. 

 So much is this the case that the milk of even one cow will 

 make an appreciable difference to the milk of a whole herd 

 of another variety. 



Of the Continental cattle may be mentioned the Dutch 

 black and white breed, which is also popular in Denmark 

 and in a large part of Germany. The animal requires no 

 testimony beyond the statement that Holland and Denmark 

 are among the finest dairying countries in the world. 



In all civilised countries cattle-breeding is an important 

 branch of agriculture, but many of the great industrial 

 populations look to the vast grazing grounds of the New 

 World and Australasia for a large proportion of their meat. 

 In the British Isles, with a population of about forty-five 

 millions, we possess about eleven million cattle ; the United 

 States has only double the population but five times as 

 many cattle ; Argentina has only a population of five 

 millions, yet owns twenty-one million cattle ; and Aus- 

 tralia and New Zealand, with a population far less than that 

 of London, possess more cattle than are in the whole of the 

 United Kingdom. Every year it is necessary to import into 

 the British Isles about a million tons of meat, and it is easy 

 to see that the three regions mentioned above will at any 

 rate be able to supply much of the beef that is required. 



ZEBU (Bos indicus}. 

 Coloured Plate XIX. Fig. 3. 



The Indian Ox, Zebu, or Brahmin Bull, bulks largely in 

 the fifty million cattle of India, and it is common in East 



