DOMESTIC CATTLE. 13 I 



It would seem as if they regarded nothing else 

 as worth ruhng over, or talking about, or fighting 

 for. Professor Max Miiller traces our word 

 "daughter" to the ancient term for a milkmaid. 

 In the good old times they plainly did not take 

 any account of young ladies who were not ac- 

 complished performers in the cow-pen. 



The cow and the ox were for lone ages the 

 chief standards of value. Everything, from a 

 new coat to a new wife, was priced at so many 

 cows. Many of our words which refer to money 

 bear traces of this, such as "fee " and " pecuniary," 

 which are directly derived from the Old English 

 and Latin words for cattle. Doubtless there 

 were currency disputes when other materials 

 began to be used for coinage, and difficulties 

 arose about the adjustment of relative values. 

 " Cow - metallism " might well have been an 

 important plank in some of the Aryan political 

 platforms. 



Our domestic cattle are descended from at 

 least two wild varieties. One, the Bos priini- 

 genius or Urics, was a magnificent beast, as tall 

 as a moose and with enormous horns. It prob- 

 ably inhabited the open, park -like country and 

 swampy, sparsely - wooded plains. Its great 



