84 



CATTLE. 



Chap. III. 



referred to in a record of the year 1220. The cattle in their 

 instincts and habits are truly wild. They are white, with 

 the inside of the ears reddish- brown, eyes rimmed with black, 

 muzzles brown, hoofs black, and horns white tipped with black. 

 Within a period of thirty-three years about a dozen calves 

 were born with "brown and blue spots upon the cheeks or 

 necks ; but these, together with any defective animals, were 

 always destroyed." According to Bewick, about the year 1770 

 some calves appeared with black ears ; but these were also 

 destroyed by the keeper, and black ears have not since re- 

 appeared. The wild white cattle in the Duke of Hamilton's 

 park, where I have heard of the birth of a black calf, are said 

 by Lord Tankerville to be inferior to those at Chillingham. The 

 cattle kept until the year 1780 by the Duke of Queensberry, but 

 now extinct, had their ears, muzzle, and orbits of the eyes black. 

 Those which have existed from time immemorial at Chartley 

 closely resemble the cattle at Chillingham, but are larger, " with 

 some small difference in the colour of the ears." "They fre- 

 quently tend to become entirely black ; and a singular super- 

 stition prevails in the vicinity that, when a black calf is born, 

 some calamity impends over the noble house of Ferrers. All 

 the black calves are destroyed." The cattle at Burton Con- 

 stable in Yorkshire, now extinct, had ears, muzzle, and the tip 

 of the tail black. Those at Grisburne, also in Yorkshire, are 

 said by Bewick to have been sometimes without dark muzzles, 

 with the inside alone of the ears brown ; and they are elsewhere 

 said to have been low in stature and hornless. 51 



The several above-specified differences in the park-cattle, 

 slight though they be, are worth recording, as they show that 

 animals living nearly in a state of nature, and exposed to 

 nearly uniform conditions, if not allowed to roam freely and 

 to cross with other herds, do not keep as uniform as truly 



51 I am much indebted to the present 

 Earl of Tankerville for information 

 about his wild cattle ; and for the skull 

 which was sent to Prof. Kiitimeyer. The 

 fullest account of the Chillingham cattle 

 is given by Mr. Hindmarsh, together 

 with a letter by the late Lord Tanker- 

 ville, in 'Annals and Mag. of Nat. 

 Hist./ vol. ii., 1839, p. 274. See Bewick, 



' Quadrupeds,' 2nd edit., 1791, p. 35, 

 note. With respect to those of the 

 Duke of Queensberry, see Pennant's 

 'Tour in Scotland,' p. 109. For those 

 of Chartley, see Low's 'Domesticated 

 Animals of Britain,' 1845, p. 238. 

 For those of Gisburne, see Bewick's 

 ' Quadrupeds, and Encyclop. of Rural 

 Sports,' p. 101. 



