1 72 Saddle and Sirloin. 



Prices may at times have been wild and fanciful, 

 and 250 guineas may seem an extravagant bull-hire, 

 but still buying good beasts and holding to approved 

 tribes, even at a large outlay, is the most profitable 

 policy in the long run. There is some method in the 

 " madness" which would give 125 guineas for " Oxford 

 nth" as a calf, 250 guineas for her as a three-year- 

 old, and 500 guineas for her as a cow, on the only three 

 occasions that this dam of " Fifth Duke of Oxford"- 

 the first prize aged bull at Chester, and a 3OOguinea 

 purchase at six months old was brought into the 

 sale-ring. When we look back to the calm foresight 

 of the Brothers Colling ; the courageous confidence of 

 Mason, the Rev. Henry Berry, and Whitaker ; " Tommy 

 Bates," and all his animated lectures on touch and 

 form in his pastures, or on the show-ground ; " A 

 quiet day at Wiseton ;" the dashing cow and heifer 

 contests between Towneley, Booth, and Douglas ; the 

 victories of " Duchess 77th" and " The Twins ;" the 

 dispersion of the late Jonas Webb's herd at the steady, 

 paying average of 55/. los. for 145 ; the brilliant 

 gathering which appraised the " Butterflies ;" the 

 8i8o/. at Willis's Rooms for seventeen Grand Dukes 

 and Duchesses ; and the two May Meetings of '67 

 in Kent and Essex, and then scan the result in so 

 many fairs and pastures, we may well feel that short- 

 horns have repaid all the money, thought, and labour 

 which have been expended upon them. Still, in one 

 way only can their supremacy be made permanent 

 by always keeping in mind the rule by which our first 

 breeders have been guided, that " a good beast must 

 be a good beast, however it has come ; but that it is to 

 pedigree alone that we can trust for succession."* 



* A great portion of this chapter is extracted from a Prize Essay on 

 Shorthorns (H. H. D. ) in the Royal Agricultural Society's Journal for 

 1865. 



