Wilson — The Colours of Highland Cattle. 69 



through it when looked at closely'" — and this source of inaccuracy is 

 intensified by the difficulty of always telling an animal's colour truly till 

 it has cast its coat. 



The following table shows the colours of calves from tlie matings in the 

 second volume of the " Herd Book/' where the colours of calves and parents 

 are recorded : — 



Table I. — Matings in volume ii. 



A first glance at this jumble of figures suggests no rule, but, remembering 

 the sources of inaccuracy, there are several probabilities. 



Before considering these, however, let us claim the assistance that may 

 be got from what is already known as to the behaviour of colours in cattle. 

 The black of the pure black breeds is dominant to the red of red breeds. 

 That being so, it follows that, if the original Highlanders were pure black 

 and the reds they absorbed their recessives, a number of the blacks must now 

 be impure blacks, and must throw some reds when interbred, while the reds 

 must breed true. At the same time, blacks and reds when bred together 

 should throw blacks and reds only. A glance at columns 1, 6, and 2 of 

 Table I. shows that Highland blacks and reds are at least partial followers 

 of the Mendelian law. The discrepancies are not too many to be accounted 

 for on the assumption that the colours of some of the calves were wrongly 

 described at registration. 



In a letter published in 1788 in the Bath Society's " Letters and Papers " 

 Sir Thomas Beevor writes :^" The cows you saw were bred from the polled 

 or hornless Suffolk dun-coloured cows by a Derbyshire black and white 

 bull given to me by my friend, Lord Townshend. This mixture produced 

 their uncommon colour of mouse and white, as well as that shape and make 

 which pleased you, and is so much esteemed by the best judges of cattle ; 

 their heads and necks being small, their legs short, carcases large and deep, 



'Wallace's "Live Stock of Great Britain." 1907, p. 139. 



