55 
in-breeding, but they do not reproduce so frequently as domestic 
cattle — not much under every two years in fact. The calves suck 
for a long period, the keepers say from one to two years, but 
domestic cattle are milked to fully as great an extent, so that this 
can have little to do with the time of breeding. They have, more- 
over, no regular breeding season, but tbe calves are produced at all 
times of the year, and of those we saw hardly two were of the same 
age, and one or two must have been calved during the severe 
weather of the present winter. Whether these peculiarities point 
to a gradual weakening of the stock from constant in-breeding I am 
unable to judge. 
The ferocity of these animals is easily provoked, particularly if 
they have suffered any injury. ' Mr. Hope, the earl’s agent, had a 
narrow escape a few years ago. He was, while with the feeding 
cart, trying to ascertain what injury had been received by one 
which appeared lame, when the animal, enraged at his close atten- 
tion, rushed at and would have gored him but for the fortunate 
proximity of the fence of one of the young plantations over which 
ho escaped. Two days afterwards he was obliged to shoot it. 
The present Earl of Tankerville, when a young man, had a narrow 
escape. He rode out on a pony to shoot an old bull which had 
been beaten and driven from the hen I, and had become dangerous, 
when the furious beast, probably irritated by an unsuccessful shot, 
rushed upon him and killed the pony instantly, ripping it up in a 
fearful manner. The earl, being nimble, just escaped by climbing 
a tree, but the brute tore away at its roots with his horns in such 
a manner that he would soon have torn it up but for the inter 
ference of the keepers, who set the dogs at his heels and distracted 
his attention till they were able by repeated shots to bring him 
down. 
After leaving the cattle we finished our afternoon in a most 
satisfactory manner by a visit to the castle, and an inspection of 
Sir Edwin Landseer’s magnificent paintings of the “ Wild Cattle,” 
“ Bed Deer,” the “ Death of the Wild Bull,” etc. 
