94 NOTES ON SOME EARLY POLLED CATTLE. 



the day she arrived at Keillor. Mr Watson afterwards 

 showed her in Ireland, where she beat all comers, and he 

 sold her for 60 guineas. Her calf was a quey she had at 

 Keillor, and I bought it at Mr Watson's sale in 1847 for 

 35 guineas. I had only one calf out of this quey (Princess 

 Daughter 832), when in 1859 pleuro - pneumonia got 

 amongst my herd of pure polled — I cannot tell how — and 

 between the 8th of January and 1st of June I had the 

 misfortune to bury about 100 head of as well-bred cattle 

 as ever were in any one's possession, reckoning that I had 

 one way or other met with a loss of £2000. I have twice 

 since commenced to breed the polled sort, and for a second 

 and third time have I been all but cleared out by that fell 

 disease, pleuro-pneumonia, and I am now frightened to 

 keep a 60-guinea beast, and am breeding from £25 cows 

 with a Shorthorn bull. I find these cows terrible eaters, 

 and often wish I had a few Black Megs, Queens, and 

 Princesses. The big brutes of cows I have, I am con- 

 vinced, eat a third more food than ever I saw doddies 

 do ; and I do not find we are so well served with milk, 

 and I feed higher than I ever fed the blacks, nor is the 

 milk of that rich quality my old favourites used to supply 

 me with. So much as to the milking- qualities of the 

 black polled breed, and the ready tendency to fatten and. 

 also to milk well that all cows of the breed have as 

 well as their progeny, who are of good mellow handle, and 

 have plenty of good hair. 



" The famous bull Panmure 51 was not bred by me at 

 all, but by the late Lord Panmure, from whom I bought 

 the bull when a year and a half old. He was out of a cow 

 called Black Meg, belonging to his lordship, not certainly 

 to me — and I never at any time said so. It is a misprint 

 altogether of Mr Eavenscroft, the editor of vol. i. of the 

 ' Herd Book,' to confuse in the way he has done Black 

 Meg of Ardovie with Black Meg of Panmure. I do not 

 think at the time the late Lord Panmure bred this bull 



