WEIGHT AND QUALITY OF BEEF. 205 



great difference in weight between bulls and steers of a 

 like age may be owing to the late period at which the 

 latter are castrated — never under three years old. In 

 this respect the practice is obviously a disadvantage, 

 but the great risk and danger are avoided which would 

 attend this operation if performed on the calves when 

 their wild and furious dams are near at hand to defend 

 them, and it allows much greater choice in the selection 

 of the bulls. The steers are generally killed at from 

 six to eight years old, and the bulls at about the same 

 age. Some of the breeding cows are allowed to live 

 to a greater age. If domesticated, and treated like 

 ordinary cattle, they would undoubtedly weigh much 

 heavier. The steer which old Cole reared and tamed 

 was computed to have weighed, when at his best, 65 

 stones, but he would have been castrated when a calf. 

 It seems surprising that the beef of these steers, cas- 

 trated so late, should be so wonderfully good; yet so it is. 

 Mr. Jacob Wilson, by the desire of Lord Tankerville, 

 sent me the round of one of the wild oxen at Christmas, 

 1874. To test its merits thoroughly, I had it cooked 

 and discussed at a public dinner at Daventry ; dozens of 

 men tasted it, and some of the best judges in the 

 country, of beef alive or dead, formed the grand jury. 

 The verdict was unanimous. Gentlemen graziers, and 

 others, all declared that " they had never eaten beef at 

 all equal to that." All agreed, like the monks of old, 

 that the flesh far exceeded that of " their a win tame 

 bestial:" and Northamptonshire has plenty of good beef 

 of every possible sort. 



This Chillingham ox was six years old, and the beef 

 was beautifully marbled and of excellent grain, in 

 colour verj r dark, like mountain mutton. It ate very 



