60 THE DOMESTICATION OF ANIMALS 



herded in winter as well as in summer to prevent de- 

 struction of plantations and enclosures. And as everyone 

 familiar with the history of Scottish agriculture during the 

 past two centuries knows, it is only within comparatively 

 recent times that open "out fields" and "in fields" gave 

 place to the enclosed fields of the present day. 



MODERN SCOTTISH CATTLE AS EXEMPLIFYING THE 

 INFLUENCE OF MAN 



The domesticated breeds of cattle existing in Scotland 

 at the present day fall into two distinct groups : a small 

 type, of which the Highland Kyloes may be taken as 

 examples, and a large and heavy type such as the 

 Aberdeen-Angus and Shorthorn breeds. Now the two races 

 from which all the modern Scottish breeds have sprung are 

 the Great Ox or Urus Bos taurus primigenius and the 

 Celtic Shorthorn ; but so distant is the ancestry, so mixed has 

 been the breeding in an effort to obtain new and better stocks, 

 and so potent has been the influence of man in perpetuating 

 the characters of his choice, that it is impossible with 

 certainty to attribute any modern breed to its originator. 

 At the best, we can only say that probability lies in the 

 suggestion that the Celtic Shorthorn, the only domestic 

 race of the early Celts, was, with its owners, ultimately 

 driven into the refuges of the mountains and islands by 

 the influx of Romans and Saxons, and there probably gave 

 rise to the characteristic mountain and island breeds the 

 Highland Kyloes and Shetlanders; while the lowland races 

 became more and more permeated by the blood of the 

 larger cattle derived from the great Urus, which the invad- 

 ing peoples brought with them from the Continent. Thus 

 at one pole of the Scottish breeds the cattle of the West 

 Highlands approach most closely the type of the Celtic 

 Shorthorn, while the Shorthorn and Aberdeen-Angus show 

 the largest proportion of the blood of races which owe 

 their ancestry to the Urus. Of other well-known Scottish 

 breeds, the old established Galloways seem to share in great 

 part the same origin as the Highland Kyloes, and the 

 Celtic Shorthorn had also much influence in the moulding 

 of the extinct Orkney and original Shetland breed, as well 



