THE SHORT-HORNED BREED, 379 



XIX.^SHORT-HORNED BREED. 



While Ireland and the western parts of England have been 

 possessed, for an unknown period, of a race of cattle having 

 long horns, and furnished with thick skins and abundant hair, 

 fitted to protect the animals from long and continued rains, 

 the eastern and drier districts towards the German Ocean 

 have been inhabited by varieties of cattle having thinner 

 skins, shorter hair, and horns comparatively short. In the 

 fens of Lincolnshire, and the other tracts of alluvial country 

 towards the Wash, the cattle were of great bulk and coarse 

 figure, and had usually a dingy colour of the skin, and short 

 blunt horns. More inland, and following the course north- 

 ward of the Vale of Trent, and thence across the Ouse, 

 through the central plains of Yorkshire, to the river Tees 

 and beyond it, the cattle assumed a less gross and unwieldy 

 form, but were still a very tall race, of varied colours, with 

 horns of medium length, but which might be termed short 

 with relation to the same parts in the Long-horned breed. 

 In comparing these varieties of cattle with the races of the 

 opposite continent, the large dingy breed of the Fens may 

 be compared with the native black cattle of the flats and 

 marshes of Holland, and the more varied kinds north of the 

 Humber, with those of Holstein and Jutland, whence the 

 finest cattle of the north of Europe have been derived. It is 

 not unreasonable to believe, that the latter, during the early 

 period of Saxon colonization, may have been brought to the 

 country by the Jutes and Angles who settled in this part of 

 England. But however this may be, no other race of cattle, 

 except that which may be termed Short or Middle-horned, 

 has ever, within the period of any known records, inhabited 

 the Fens and north-eastern parts of England. 



But at a long subsequent period, near our own times, it 

 appears that cattle were frequently brought from the oppo- 

 site continent, and mingled with the native varieties. They 



