SECRETARY'S REPORT. 13 



in wliich a weight exceeding four hundred pounds was rarely 

 reached, have been developed to those important breeds wliich 

 are now of so much value to that kingdom, and have been 

 scattered so widely over the globe. 



And, in addition to this, the soil and climate of almost every 

 region have aided the judicious agriculturist in developing a 

 breed particularly adapted to local necessities. Not that soil 

 and climate alone will do this. For it was not the valley of the 

 Tees which brought the hard-hided, coarse-boned, thriftless, 

 misshapen, lyery cattle of Holland,* and the profitless frames 

 of Yorkshire, up to the perfection of modern improved Short- 

 horns — it was a farmer of that valley, using the soil and climate, 

 and breeding aright. So it was the intelligent farmers of 

 Ayrshire, who adapted themselves to the agricultural capacity 

 of that region, and raised the miserable cows of their hills to 

 the superiority of their modern dairy animals. In neither case 

 did they attempt to force a breed of cattle upon an uncongenial 

 soil and climate. Mr. Alton knew the value of the hills and 

 vales of Scotland for dairy purposes. The Messrs. Colling 

 understood how beef would grow, if properly planted, on the 

 fat pastures of England. Let us imitate their example. 



It is a disregard of the rules which they fpllowed, in fact of 

 all proper rules, which has brought confusion to the cattle- 

 breeding of New England, and has rendered it thus far too 

 much a profitless game of chance. Amidst the many wise and 

 praiseworthy efforts which have been made to improve our 

 herds, there has been a great deal of bad breeding, which, with 



* " The Short-horned cattle, under -which denomination are indiscriminately 

 included the Dutch, Holderness and Teeswater breeds, are supposed to have 

 acquired the appellation of Dutch, from a cross with some large bulls that 

 were imported near a century ago from Holland into Yorkshire, in the east 

 and north sidings of -which county the t-wo latter had been long established. 

 It has, ho-wever, been doubted whether any advantage -was derived from this 

 intermixture ; for the increase thus obtained in size was thought to have been 

 counterbalanced by a more than appropriate increase of offal. But, fortu- 

 nately, the error was not universal ; for some intelligent breeders, aware even 

 at that day of the superiority of symmetry to bulk, preserved the breed of 

 which they were already in possession, in its native purity ; and it is from 

 some of that stock, so maintained, or, at least, from a cross between that stock 

 and some of the progeny of the Dutch and Teeswater cross, that the present 

 improved Short-horned cattle, are descended." — Complete Grazier. 



