316 TILE OX. 



and the lower grounds of the coasts. But, generally, the 

 county of Aberdeen may be described as being rocky, barren 

 of soil in most parts, and interspersed with great tracts of 

 peat, covering the site of those noble forests which once over- 

 spread this part of Scotland. The cattle vary with place, 

 and the natural or acquired fertility of the parts where they 

 have been naturalized. In the higher and wilder districts 

 inland, they are identical with those of the Central High- 

 lands ; and even in the lower country, where a mixture of 

 blood has taken place, their characters evince that the parent 

 stock has been that of the Highland mountains. But in the 

 cultivated country, they have become enlarged in size with 

 the progress of cultivation, and altered in their characters 

 by the admixture of other races. Up to a late period in the 

 last century, all the principal labours of tillage in this part of 

 Scotland were performed by oxen, which caused the farmers 

 to cultivate size and strength as a property of their cattle, 

 and to resort to the richer districts southward for larger ani- 

 mals than their own district produced, and especially to the 

 eastern part of Fifeshire, where the Falkland breed was 

 reared. Although the cattle of the lower parts of Aberdeen- 

 shire became, from these causes, enlarged in size, they long 

 remained of bad form, having thick skins, long horns, and 

 coarse extremities. With the progress of improvement, how- 

 ever, during the present century, a variety has been culti- 

 vated and widely extended, now generally termed the Polled 

 Aberdeenshire Breed, in which the absence of horns may be 

 ascribed in part to the introduction of the hornless cattle of 

 other districts, but mainly to the breeding from animals of 

 the native stock which possessed this peculiarity, in prefer- 

 ence to those having the long horns characteristic of the 

 older race. This modern variety, however, scarcely even yet 

 presents that uniformity of characters which constitutes a 

 true breed, although it is continually approaching to this 

 condition, in consequence of increased attention to breeding, 

 and more extended intercourse between the different parts of 



