200 THE VALLEY OF THE TEME 



rapidly-growing cattle for the butcher. Crossed with 

 a Herefordshire bull, the animals were black but re- 

 tained their white faces ; and crosses of this type 

 from either Galloway or Aberdeen Angus cattle are 

 not unfrequently seen in the district. With an 

 ordinary red or roan Shorthorn the Galloways pro- 

 duce completely black cattle, although from the same 

 cross when a white Shorthorn bull is used come the 

 blue-greys which are so well known in the South of 

 Scotland and about the Border. 



A certain amount of light horsebreeding was done 

 by the farmers among the hills ; and the local Hunt 

 had been very active in promoting this industry and 

 in helping men towards a better type of horse, even to 

 the extent of lending farmers brood mares of quality 

 from which they could raise a foal and obtain a certain 

 amount of light work. We did not, however, gather 

 from the farmers that any use was made of the Board 

 of Agriculture's Horsebreeding Scheme, or even that 

 anything about it was known in the district, though 

 the men with whom we were talking both bred horses 

 and were connected with the Hunt. 



Of the live stock of the district, however, sheep 

 afforded perhaps the most interesting problems. We 

 were on the borders of the district where the Shrop- 

 shires originated, and many of the upland farmers keep 

 pure flocks, though, like the other Down breeds, they 

 are more properly sheep of the arable land. We were 

 also within easy reach of the extensive upland sheep 

 walks of Mid Wales, and the lower hills of Radnor and 

 Montgomery have from time immemorial held a race 

 of sheep which has, to some extent, been locally 

 differentiated and yet again hopelessly intermixed by 

 crossing and by a greater or less infusion of Shrop- 

 shire blood. The foundation of all the breeds seems 



