CATTI<E. 279 



kindly, intelligent, honest in his labor. We have seen them from half 

 to three-quarters blood, crossed from the common cow, and up to thor- 

 ough bred, all of great excellence as draught beasts, well matched, and 

 admirable in all their points. The Hereford blood is strong in marking 

 its descent. From the bulls which were kept in our neighborhood 

 eighteen years ago, crossed upon cows which run on the adjacent com- 

 mons, in their summer pasturage, we now, in theiv progeny, to later 

 generations, frequently see cows and oxen but a quarter, an eighth, or 

 sixteenth in blood — got by scrub bulls — that show strong Hereford 

 marks in form and color. 



" Where hay and pasturage are cheap, and the farmer has a taste for 

 the business, it must be a profitable investment to obtain a thorough 

 bred Hereford bull, cross him on well selected native red cows, and rear 

 and break steers for the markets where good working oxen are in de- 

 mand. The strong blood of the bull will give uniformity in shape and 

 color, so that the steers may be easily matched, and if not wanted for 

 the yoke, they are equally valuable, as other cattle, for feeding and the 

 shambles. 



As a Beef Animal, ' ' The Hereford is superior. They feed 

 kindly, are thrifty in growth, mature early — at three and four years old 

 — and prove well on the butchers' block. We are aware that they have 

 not now a general popularity in the great cattle breeding regions of 

 our Western states. Few of them have been introduced there, and 

 those, perhaps, not in the right hands to push them to the best advan- 

 tage. We could wish for tliem a fairer trial ; but the prejudice against 

 the cows as milkers, and the lack in their taking appearance as a highly 

 distinctive race, in comparison with the more taking shorthorns, have 

 kept them back in public demand. Their time has not yet come; and 

 it may be, that in the right hands, and with a more critical observation 

 among our cattle breeders and graziers, they may achieve a reputation 

 as a grazing beast, equal to some now considered their superiors. 



" In their native counties in England, they still hold a high rank, and 

 at the prize shows in the I/Ondon markets compete successfully with 

 other improved breeds. With all the deficiencies which the advocates 

 of other breeds allege against them, the Herefords still maintain theii 

 reputation among the Knglish breeders, who hold on to them with a 

 pertinacity which shows an unabated confidence in their merits and 

 profit as a true grazier's beast. We might show recorded tables of their 

 trials, in England, with shorthorns, and the relative profits of their feed- 



