318 WILD WHITE CATTLE OF GREAT BRITAIN. 



herd dispersed (about 1820), these cows were put to 

 any bull which happened to be at hand, many of these 

 being horned ; yet, says Mr. Gilbert, " they continued 

 to breed true to pattern, whatever bulls might be em- 

 ployed, through a long series of years." As he was 

 one of the youngest of a large family, Mr. Gilbert first 

 recollects one of these white cows in 1834 or 1835. 

 " She was polled, with black ears and muzzle, and had 

 always calves like herself; except that in one or two 

 cases these calves had reddish-brown instead of black 

 ears and muzzles. For nearly thirty years," says he, 

 " I can recall that old cow's descendants, which, like 

 her immediate offspring, almost invariably ' took after ' 

 herself. At intervals, as time wore on, a few black 

 spots were to be found on the neck, near the eye, and 

 about the muzzle of some ; and eventually some came 

 with horns ; yet almost at the last of my seeing that 

 stock — that is, nearly thirty years after I first knew 

 them — a white polled calf with black ears, and of the 

 original type, was born to a pedigree Short-horn bull 

 from her great-great-great-grand-daughter. I also 

 recollect that the old white cow's bull-calves, if reared 

 and steered — which occasionally happened — grew very 

 fast, and became unusually tall. I remember, too, a 

 neighbour — who was born in the neighbourhood of 

 Blickling, at the end of the last century — telling me that 

 the white cattle there, when he was a boy, ' were rare 

 big uns ; taller than I am at the withers ; ' yet he was 

 a man of full average stature. There are also traditions 

 of a similar breed of white polled cattle in the Down- 

 ham district. Occasionally, even now, polled steers of 

 gigantic stature are to be found: I saw one, in 1877, 

 which certainly stood six feet high." 



