CLASS I. MAMMALIA: ORDER 9. RUMINANTIA. 



499 





WV&^t, 



LOXG-HORNED OX. 



THE POLLED OR HORNLESS CATTLE. 



The stewartry of Kircudbright and the shire of Wigton, with a part of Ayrshire and Dum- 

 fries, formed the ancient province of Galloway in Scotland. The two first counties possess much 

 interest as the native district of a breed of polled, or dodded, or humble cattle, highly valued for 

 its grazing properties. So late as the middle of the last century, the greater part of the Galloway 

 cattle were horned — they were middle-horns : but some were polled — they were either remnants 

 of the native breed, or the characteristic of the aboriginal cattle would be occasionally displayed, 

 although many a generation had passed. For more than one hundred and fifty years the surplus 

 cattle of Galloway had been sent far into England, and principally into the counties of Norfolk 

 and Suffolk. The polled beasts were always favorites with the English farmers; they fattened as 

 kindly as the others, they attained a larger size, their flesh lost none of its fineness of grain, and 

 they exhibited no wildness and dangerous ferocity, which are sometimes serious objections to the 

 Highland breed. Thence it happened that, in process of time, the horned Galloway breed de- 

 creased, and was at length quite superseded bv the polled. These are now divided into several 

 varieties, and being highly valued, are extensively in use. 



THE LONG-HORNS. 



In the district of Craven, in Yorkshire, there has been, from the earliest records of British 

 agriculture, a peculiar and valuable breed of cattle. They were distinguished from the home 

 breeds of other counties by a disproportionate and frequently unbecoming length of horn. In the 

 old breed, this horn frequently projected almost horizontally on either side, but as the cattle were 

 improved the horn assumed other directions; it hung down so that the animal could scarcely 

 graze, or it curved so as to threaten to meet before the muzzle, and so also as to prevent the beast 

 trom grazing; or immediately under the jaw, and so to lock the lower jaw; or the points pre- 

 sented themselves against the bones of the nose and face, threatening to perforate them. In pro- 

 portion as the breed became improved, the horns lengthened, and they are characteristically 

 distinguished by the name of the " Long-Horns." Cattle of a similar description were found in 

 the districts of Lancashire bordering on Craven, and also in the southeastern parts of Westmore- 

 land; but tradition, in both of these districts pointed to Craven as the original habitation of the 

 .ong-horn breed. If there gradually arose any difference between them, it was that the Craven 

 leasts were the broadest in the chine, the shortest, the handsomest, and the quickest feeders ; the 



