BREEDING 23 



explain the reason. The London high- 

 class butcher knows the particular county 

 or district which produces the best-quality 

 meat at given periods of the year. Let us 

 follow the seasons with beef, for example, 

 and start at Christmas. Top quality then 

 is Scotch and Norfolks, because the 

 roots, pulse, and fodder in those localities 

 are the finest grained and best, hence the 

 meat the same. Norfolks will keep on to, 

 say, the second week in June, long after 

 the Scots are exhausted, and will then be 

 superseded by the first crop of early 

 grass-fed shorthorns off the Lincolnshire 

 fens and marshes. Just before August 

 Herefords assume the command, followed, 

 seven or eight weeks later, by Runts. If 

 (for example) you took a Hereford and 

 Runt of equal weight to Islington the first 

 week in August, and asked a high-class 

 butcher ;^20 each for them, he would say. 



