CATTLE OF SCOTLAND. g7 



Leaving out the Orkneys, and Shetlands, whose cattle are 

 too diminutive to attract our particular notice, these western 

 groups of islands, together with tlie Highlands proper, of Scot- 

 land, possess a hardy race of middle-horned cattle, long termed 

 "Kyloes,"' so called, as Sir John Sinclair asserts, "from their 

 crossing so many kyloes, or ferries, which abound in the west of 

 Scotland." "Others," says Youatt, "and with more propriety, 

 one of whom is Mr. Macdonald, the author of the ' Agriculture 

 of the Highlands,' tell us, that it is a corruption of the Gaelic 

 word which signifies highland, and is commonly pronounced as 

 if spelled Kael." These cattle, all, probably, of one generic 

 origin, have been intermixed by various crosses, within them- 

 selves, so as to become hornogeneous in nature, habit, and 

 appearance, and as Scottish agriculture in the islands and the 

 .Mghlands has progressed, the cattle have also been better culti- 

 vated and cared for, and within a century past highly improved, 

 so as now to assume a distinct name and character, as " West 

 Highlands." To these our attention will now be directed. 



THE WEST HIGHLAND CATTLE. 



There are no " Highland " cattle in the ' United States. At 

 least, we do not know of any. Our impression is that a few 

 were imported some years ago into Upper Canada, but what 

 has become of them, if such was the fact, we have never 

 learned. We have immense ranges of land in our mountain 

 districts, in various parts of the older States, which when 

 properly subdued, will become a pastoral country. The vast 

 plains west and north of the Missouri, as well as the wide 

 mountain ranges which traverse them, must mainly be occupied 

 in breeding and grazing cattle, if anything. Those lands will be 

 admirably adapted to a class of cattle like the "West High- 

 lands." No really superior class of our present cattle are, as 

 yet, properly fitted for the wild and roving hfe of such a country. 



