FORMERLY A POLLED HERD. 343 



enough among sheep and deer. The Hamilton herd 

 are, I believe, the sole instance of this in the British 

 Islands. But there is yet further corroboration. Youatt, 

 in his work on "Cattle," published nearly forty years 

 since, speaks of the Hamilton cattle as being polled. 

 He commences his account of " The Foiled Cattle " with 

 these words : — " We have already stated that there 

 appear to be the remnants of two distinct breeds of 

 aboriginal cattle in the parks of Chillingham, in 

 Northumberland, and Chatelherault,* in Lanarkshire; 

 the first are middle horns, and the second are polled." 

 And in another part of his book f he quotes, from Mr. 

 Macgillivray's older " Prize Essay on the Present State 

 of the Outer Hebrides," the following passage : — " The 

 most common colours " (of the Hebridean cattle) " are 

 black, red, brown, brandered (that is, a mixture of red 

 and brown, with stripes — brindled). A whitish dun 

 colour is also pretty frequently seen, not unlike that of 

 the original wild cattle of Scotland, both the horned 

 breed at Chillingham and the polled one at Hamilton ; 

 and it is remarked that in all their traditions or fables 

 of what are called fairy cattle this is the colour ascribed 

 to these animals." It is nearly impossible to resist the 

 conclusion that about this time the Hamilton herd under- 

 went the above-mentioned change. And the absence of 

 horns was certainly considerable, even in the males 

 (which Mr. Brown does not mention), a few years 

 since, for James Aitchison, Sir John Orde's grieve, 

 whose brother Eobert was at the time, and for many 

 years after, forester at Hamilton and Cadzow, informs 



* Cadzow is meant, called Chatelherault from the Duke of Hamilton's 

 French dukedom. 

 t Chap. iiL, p. 71. 



