268 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



our midst. The Alderney cattle are natives of Jersey and the 

 Channel Islands, where they have been bred from time imme- 

 morial. They are very small ; usually of a fawn and white, or 

 brown and white color ; though animals nearly black are not 

 unfrequent. If we except a bright eye, delicate muzzle, and a 

 sharp little horn, which give them a certain game look, these 

 raw-boned little creatures can hardly be deemed beautiful. 

 Probably four out of five of our farmers unacquainted with 

 their merits would pass them by with derision, regarding them 

 as ridiculous monsters in ugliness, if not in size. But let any 

 one of these farmers behold a few pans of Alderney milk upon 

 which the golden cream had risen, or spread upon bread the 

 delicious butter made by his thrifty wife from that same cream, 

 and these little cattle will be clothed with a beauty that the 

 eye alone was unable to discover. 



The Alderney cattle have always, as far back as their histo- 

 ry extends, maintained an unrivalled reputation as producers 

 of delicious cream, from which is made the finest butter. It is 

 said that, wherever they have been introduced, these cattle 

 have never failed to sustain their home reputation. Their 

 yield in milk is never very large ; but the milk is always ex- 

 ceedingly rich, producing rarely less than twenty-five, and often 

 thirty-five, per cent, of rich cream, always of a deep golden 

 hue. For a long period Alderney cows have been kept upon 

 the estates of the nobility and wealthy gentlemen in England, 

 to supply the tables of the proprietor with cream and butter of 

 the finest quality ; but they have never been kept in any con- 

 siderable numbers by the farmers, who have found other breeds 

 more profitable. Latterly, however, dairy farmers have be- 

 come satisfied that they were doing well in giving a strain of 

 this blood to their milking herd. Many years ago small im- 

 portations of Alderney cattle were made into the United States, 

 and their descendants are still known and appreciated. With- 

 in a few years these importations have been numerous, and we 

 can now, by personal observation, test their good qualities. In 

 1851, Mr. Thomas Motley, Jr., of Jamaica Plain, was sent 

 abroad by the Massachusetts Agricultural Society for the ex- 

 press purpose of selecting Alderney s to be introduced among 

 the cattle of the State. How well he executed his mission, 



