aeiv PLEISTOCENE MAMMALIA. 



date of its introduction into Britain. It was probably derived from the south of 

 Europe, and may have been introduced during the later times of the Roman occupation. 

 It is, however, unrepresented in the numerous refuse-heaps of Roman age. 



The hornless breeds of sheep date back in our country from the days of the Romans, 

 since the hornless skulls have been discovered, associated with Roman remains, in London. 1 

 From the analogy of the cattle it is certain that they were derived from a horned race, 

 such as the Welsh, or old Irish, or Exmoor breeds. Nevertheless, the horned is more 

 abundant in the Roman refuse heaps than the hornless, and in those days was the 

 dominant breed. 



The polled, or hornless, cattle of the present day have undoubtedly been derived 

 through careful breeding from the horned cattle. The Galloway breed has lost its horns 

 principally through the care of the grandfather of the present Earl of Selkirk, to whom I 

 am indebted for the account given in full in the notes. Some fifty or sixty years were 

 consumed in bringing the animal to its present shape and form. 2 



The English Breed of Oxen. 



Among the numerous varieties of living horned cattle there are two distinct stocks 

 which graduate into each other, namely, the small dark Welsh and Scotch mountain 

 cattle, and the larger red and variegated breeds which now are to be found throughout 

 Britain and Ireland, except in a few isolated districts. The relation between these two 

 breeds is of great historical importance, because it throws light on the vexed question as 

 to the extent to which our English ancestors harried and ruthlessly destroyed the Roman 

 provincials, whom they invaded. We will first of all examine the probable date of the 

 introduction of the larger breed, which, according to Professors Nilsson and Rutimeyer, is 



1 In coll. of Gen. Lane Fox. 



2 " The breed a hundred and fifty years ago was not generally ' polled,' i. e., without horns, though 

 there was always a good many polled ones amongst them. Polled ones are found in every breed. My 

 informant wa3 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 McKinnan, 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. 6d. 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, to breed from, and thus the change was effected in, I believe, 

 from fifty to sixty years. The horns of the Galloway beast 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 nowadays, when 

 horns appear, they are generally traced to some cross with an Irish brute. Those that are born polled have 

 a lump in the centre of the forehead, which is very hard, and will break another bull's skull for him." 

 (Extract of a letter from the Earl of Selkirk to the author 6th March, 1867.) 



