FIRST CENTURY OF DAIRYING IN NEW SOUTH WALES. 



Romans. At a later period, while the Danes were ravaging England 

 with varied success, under the Saxon rule cattle were brought in from 

 the neighbouring Continent, and also exported from the island. They 

 were kept in such numbers as to be a considerable portion of tru- 

 wealth of the people. With the dominion of the Normans came ths 

 division of the land into great estates, which were given to the re- 

 tainers of William the Conqueror, and the gradual subdivision and 

 settlement of these estates into farms; the establishment of a tenantry, 

 and, after a long time, an improvement in the system of agriculture. 

 There was little intercourse among the people belonging to the dif- 

 ferent localities. Roads were lew and bad ; the tenants mostly paid 

 their rents, taxes, and tithes to landlord, Church, and King with cattle 

 :eared on the farms. The surplus were chietiy driven away by dealers 

 who purchased them at the farms, or at the neighbouring fairs. The 

 home herds thus became localised and indigenous to the soils on which 

 they were reared. Hence, in the course of centuries, the people began 

 to look upon their little country as the chief centre of the whole world 

 and their breeds of live stock as the aboriginal race of the island, 

 which had been evolved into the highest order of perfection by their 

 forefathers since the loth century of the Christian era. 



Without any wish to withhold from the cattle breeders of England 

 who lived during that long period which extends from the loth to 

 the i6th century of our history, which must have been a slow, tedious 

 form of advancement at best as regards the development of stock, as 

 compared to the vast strides made in that direction during the three 

 following centuries there is, however, something to be explained 

 away with regard to the origin of the semi-wild white cattle pre- 

 served in Chillingham Park in England for centuries. 



The Rev. Mr. Storer would have us believe that at Chillingham we 

 might look upon the pure descendants of the ancient Urus, and in 

 :\IQ Highlands of Scotland upon a living specimen of the ancient 

 Longifrons. We would, therefore, in these two cases, have beiore us 

 animals of almost complete sameness. So much alike are these two 

 specimens that it is argued that while the Ayrshire takes the character 

 of its head and horns from the one, it also takes the well-recognise-l 

 ^inch out of the ear from the other ; whilst from the mingling of the 

 \ hite and black colors they get that remarkable "dollar spot.'' Li, 

 therefore, we could accept the Rev. Mr. Storer's theory of the origin 

 of our races of domesticated cattle in Great Britain and Ireland, we 

 need only trace back a little farther, and we would discover the genus 

 Bos, which was liberated from the Ark by Noah. 



Frennell, in his "Natural History of the Ancients," says: 'I know 

 of no existing wild species which I can refer to as the original type 

 of the common domesticated ox. In many parts of the world there 

 are wild herds, and very extensive herds of the same species; but this 

 we have the testimony of history to prove that they have originated 

 from individuals that had escaped from domestication." 



It would therefore, seem to be mere waste of time to attempt, in 

 the absence of any reliable history, to claim for the semi-wild cat:le 

 of either England. Wales, or Scotland, date but few centuries posterior 

 to the fifth century of our history, or immediately before the Saxon 

 or Teutonic invasion, when seeking out their origin. 



There is no modern breed of cattle so much given to produce colors 

 which correspond with those cf Chillingham Park. England, as the 

 Longhorned Durham, a breed that was perfected by Mates 

 .-nid other breeders in the Valley of the Tees (England) 

 prior to the perfecting of the bee-i Shorthorn-. The hulls 

 of this breed had a decided tendency when mated with light- 

 colored cows to produce white calves. Thi> .uave rise to the g- 

 fancy that set in about this period in other counties in England 



144. 



