BOS TAURUS. 



to the Devons in their value as working oxen, and in the rich- 

 ness of their milk. The Short-horns are assigned a high an- 

 tiquity by the oldest breeders in the counties of Durham and 

 Yorkshire, England, the place of their origin, and for a long 

 time of their almost exclusive breeding. From the marked 

 and decided improvement which they stamp upon other ani- 

 mals, they are evidently an ancient breed, though much the 

 juniors of the Devon and Hereford. Their highly artificial 

 style, form, and character are unquestionably the work of 

 deeply studied and long-continued art ; and to the same de- 

 gree that they have been moulded in unresisting compliance 

 with the dictation of their breeders, have they departed from 

 that light and more agile form of the Devon, which conclu- 

 sively and beyond the possibility of contradiction marks the 

 more primitive race. 



THE HEREFORD. The oxen of Herefordshire are .much 

 larger than the Devon, and of a darker red, some are dark 

 yellow, and a few brindled ; they generally have white faces, 

 bellies, and throats. They have thicker hides than those of 

 Devonshire, and they are more hardy, and shorter in the car- 

 cass and leg ; are higher, heavier, and broader in the chine ; 

 have more fat and are rounder and wider across the hips ; 

 the thigh is more muscular, the shoulders larger. Marshall 

 describes them very correctly, as follows : " The counte- 

 nance pleasant, cheerful, open ; the forehead broad ; eye full 

 and lively ; horns bright, taper, and spreading ; head small ; 

 chap lean ; neck long and tapering ; chest deep ; bosom broad, 

 and projecting forward ; shoulder-bone thin, flat, no way pro- 

 tuberant in bone, but full and mellow in flesh ; chest full ; loin 

 broad ; hips standing wide and level with the spine ; quarters 

 long and wide at the neck ; rump even with the general level 

 of the back ; not drooping nor standing high and sharp above 

 the quarters ; tail slender and neatly haired ; barrel round 

 and roomy, the carcass throughout deep and well spread ; ribs 

 broad, standing close and flat on the outer surface, forming a 

 smooth, even barrel, the hindmost large and of full length ; 

 round bone small, snug, not prominent ; thigh clean, and reg- 

 ularly tapering ; legs upright and short ; bone below the knee 

 and hough small ; feet of middle size ; cod and twist round 

 and full ; flank large ; flesh everywhere mellow, soft, yielding 

 pleasantly to the touch, especially in the chine, the shoulder, 

 and the ribs ; hide mellow, supple, of a middle thickness and 



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