662 Report on the Cattle Exhibited at Windsor. 
dairy properties were of less value, and that intermixing, and the 
offspring being always selected and reared for the dairy, their 
descendants formed a distinct breed, modified, farther, in regard 
to colour, when the brown and white gained preference ? 
Breeds do not, in the first instance, drop down into a district 
ready cut out and coloured to order. The various component 
elements gravitate, or percolate — to vary the figure — towards the 
centre where there is a demand for them — a demand without 
concert, created by the wants of men individually. Selection is 
regulated by demand, not often with the object of raising a new 
breed, although the rise of a new breed, eventually, is the result; 
and the improvement and development of the breed, when 
established, are then designedly effected by a few leading men. 
The Ayrshire gradually attracted notice outside its native 
district, having proved itself a dairy breed of the first class of 
merit, not large, but of size most suitable for districts which 
cannot maintain large-framed cattle, and yielding an immense 
return in proportion to food consumed, besides being constitu- 
tionally habituated to a moist climate, and in type so fixed (with 
permissible variations of colour and the distribution of colour) 
that an Ayrshire cow's breed would be known if only her milk- 
vessel were seen. Not only single specimens, but breeding 
herds, have been long spread over the United Kingdom and 
foreign countries, in some cases under Government ownership 
for the benefit of the provinces, as in Sweden. Systematic 
improvement has now gone on for nearly 100 years. 
In June, 1877, a number of breeders formed the Ayrshire 
Cattle Herd-book Society of Great Britain and Ireland, which 
had not been in existence many months when the first volume of 
the Herd-book was issued, in the beginning of 1878. Ever 
since, volume has followed volume as regularly as year followed 
year, and always in the beginning of the year, so that there are 
now twelve volumes, the entries in which number 6,100 cows 
and 1,831 bulls. The twelfth volume contains the names of 123 
breeders ; so the Ayrshires may be considered as fairly on their 
legs and ready to go anywhere, taking with them duly authenti- 
cated records of pure descent. Their dairy records, however, 
constitute their primary claim to extended patronage. An 
eminent authority, Mr. William Bartlemore, of Paisley, in a 
sketch of the history and characteristics of the breed, contri- 
buted to the "Melbourne Leader" in the autumn of last year, 
says : — 
" A fair average of herds of say 50 cows, not specially selected, runs from 
630 to 6G0 gallons jier annum. In any view, one is quite justified in saying 
that an Ayrshire cow ought to yield over 620 gallons per annum, showing 
