TYPES OF OLD BUCHAN COWS. 75 



ling along with her nose quite near the ground. Both 

 types were famed for their milking qualities, and especi- 

 ally their fine-flavoured butter." 



Mr James Smith, Burnshangie, writing of the polled 

 cattle formerly in Buchan, says : " On some of the larger 

 farms in this neighbourhood, the markings of the different 

 families or stocks would seem to have been very distinct 

 and preserved. They went by the names of the different 

 farms on which they were bred. Thus, the Strichen 

 breed were mostly brindled ; while at Gowanfold, in 

 Eathen, there was a belted race — black animals with a 

 white belt round their waist. There was also a ' rigget ' 

 race, or black with a white ridge along the back. The 

 most general sorts, however, were black, or black with a 

 little white below, and about the legs, a white udder being 

 regarded as the sign of a good milker. There was also 

 another very good sort, black with a brown back. The 

 cows — of course I am speaking of the better sorts — were 

 deep, wide, roomy animals, — a necessary feature; and 

 their milking-properties, which were good, were carefully 

 cultivated. I recollect well the Skillymarno polled stock. 

 They were black with white udder, and generally a white 

 spot in the face. Some of them came as a ' tocher ' [mar- 

 riage dowry] with Skillymarno's daughter, on her marriage 

 to the tenant of the next farm to my father's. Here they 

 were several times crossed with good Shorthorn bulls; 

 but although they became blue in colour, no scurs were 

 ever seen upon them. I happened to mention this to one 

 of the Messrs Cruickshank of Sittyton, who remarked that 

 he could quite understand it, for they had obtained a 

 polled cow from the late Mr John Hutchinson of Mony- 

 ruy ; and after her progeny had been crossed for five gen- 

 erations with Shorthorn bulls, neither horns nor scurs 

 appeared. The nearest approach to the best types of our 

 old Buchan cows that I can recollect seeing is old ' Char- 

 lotte of Fyvie,' purchased by Lord Southesk at the disper- 



