1867. J BOYD DAWKIl^'S— BOS LONGIFKOI^S. 177 



common variety of Bos longlfrons at the other. The truth of the 

 great variability of the so-called species, first brought home to me 

 in Dublin in 1864, is amply confirmed in all the other cases of a 

 large quantity of the remains having been brought together for 

 comparison, as in the British and Oxford Museums, and in that of 

 the Eoyal College of Surgeons. In consequence of this I am unable 

 to assign any characters of specific value to the animal. Specific 

 distinctions, indeed, based on size of horn, or of frontal sinuses, are 

 proved to be totally devoid of value by the history of the Galloway 

 breed of polled cattle, for which I am indebted to the Eight Hon. the 

 Earl of Selkirk, P.K.S.* One hundred and fifty years ago that breed 

 was possessed of horns ; but, owing to the greater market value of the 

 few polled varieties among them, the latter were encouraged at the 

 expense of the horned, until the whole breed became possessed of its 

 present characters. The last trace of the horn in the breed is fur- 

 nished by the Eev. "W. Bingley, in 1809. " Some few of the ani- 

 mals," he writes, " in every other respect polled, have two little 

 useless horns from two to four inches long, which hang down loose, 

 and are not, as in other cattle, inserted into the skull^f. At the pre- 

 sent day, in the purely bred Galloway beast, there is no trace of 

 horn. Thus we have clear proof of the metamorphosis of a horned 

 into a hornless breed, and, therefore, that even the possession of 

 horns is not essentially characteristic of a given race of cattle. 



For full details of the osseous structure of Bos longifrons I must 

 refer to those of the domestic Ox, Bos taurus, in the various books of 

 Natural History, instead of bringing irrelevant matter before the 

 notice of the Society. 



3. Synonyms. 



The Bos longifrons of Owen is also termed the B. hrachyceros, 

 Owen, under which name the animal is known in France and Ger- 



^ " I have no distinct written record about the way the horns of the Galloway 

 cattle were ' bred out,' as we cattle-breeders would say. The breed, a hundred 

 and fifty years ago, was not generally ' polled ' i. e. without horns, though there 

 were always a good many polled ones among them. Polled ones are found in 

 every breed. My informant was an old man who died about thirty years ago, 

 he being then near ninety. He was the son of the man who tended the cows for 

 my grandfather, and had been employed among cattle all his life : in his old age, 

 while still able to work, he tended my cows. His name was James Mc Kinnan, 

 and he was a man whose recollections seemed always remarkably clear. He had 

 been with cattle as far as Norfolk, to St. Faith's fair. He told me that, in the 

 days of his childhood, a Norfolk feeder, who bought many of the Galloway cattle, 

 fancied those without horns, and would give 2s. Q>d. or so more for a polled than 

 for a horned beast. This set the fashion ; and the people began first to look for 

 polled bulls and none other ; then they preferred the polled cows, &c. &c. to 

 breed from ; and thus the change was effected in, I believe, from 50 to 60 years. 

 The horns of the Galloway beasts were very ugly, drooping, and as thick at the 

 point as at the root. I have myself seen one or two beasts with horns like that ; 

 but now-a-days when horns appear, they are generally traced to some cross with 

 an Irish brute. Those that are born polled, have a bump in the centre of the 

 forehead, which is very hard and will break another bull's skull for him." — Ex- 

 tract from a letter of the Earl of Selkirk, dated 6th March, 1867. 



t Memoirs of British Quadrupeds, p. 418. 8vo. London. 



