250 HISTORY OF THE SHORT-HORNS. 



dates and pedigrees of the Short-horns as they stand in Coates' five 

 volumes, and there leave them. 



It may be supposed that the several men engaged in breeding had 

 sold during the anterior years of their labors a large number of well- 

 bred Short-horns, which had not found their way into the first, nor 

 afterwards into either the second or third volumes of the Herd Book ; 

 but many of them, and the produce of two or three of their descend- 

 ing generations, may have come into the fourth and fifth, which in the 

 year 1844, at the end of twenty-two years from the publication of the 

 first, embraced an addition of 3,802 bulls, and full as many cows, thus 

 gathering during the last seven years since volume three was printed 

 a large majority of the well-bred Short-horns of England, Scotland 

 and Ireland, entitled to record, besides many additional American 

 pedigrees beyond what were recorded in the previous books. 



The fourth volume, containing only bulls, like the first, second and 

 third, had many animals by name simply, some with only a sire, 

 others with but a single sire and dam ; many more with not over two 

 or three known crosses, and a large number of them without notice 

 by whom they were bred, or when they were born whether in the 

 last century or the present thus gathering the known animals of the 

 race under one legitimate fountain-head where their future pro- 

 duce could be traced into a common genealogy of blood, whether 

 that blood could be definitely traced further back into pure sources, 

 or not. In this general "consolidation" to use a comprehensive 

 phrase of the present day the British Short-horn public at large 

 acquiesced and were satisfied. With a very few noted exceptions, 

 everything recorded there was considered by the general consent of 

 English breeders a " Herd Book Short-horn," and as such, its pro- 

 duce was entitled to record in any and every future Herd Book 

 which should be anywhere published. 



To an antiquarian in Short-horn genealogy the above summary 

 may seem to arrive at both a sweeping and arbitrary conclusion. 

 Yet the breeding world of Great Britain sustained it, and followed 

 out their own pedigrees in pursuance of the then established records 

 from which there has been little or no appeal ; or if appeal were 

 made it was only in personal complaints, to which the breeding pub- 

 lic paid no particular attention, falling back on the Herd Book 

 record, after all, as the standard of blood and genealogy, there being 

 no appellate court to set the records aside. 



The sixth volume of the Herd Book, under Mr. Stafford's com- 

 pilation, followed the fifth volume of Coates' within the next two 



