132 
AMERICAN AGRICULTURIST. 
DEVON BULL—FRANK QUARTLY 
American Cattle—III- 
['Continued f rom page 77.] 
THE DEVONS. 
What the turf horse, and its ancient progenitor 
the Arabian, is among horses, the Devon is among 
cattle. They are claimed in England as an abori¬ 
ginal race, and to have existed in the island pre¬ 
vious to its conquest by the Romans. Yet, from 
all accounts, the Devon has, jrom the earliest 
times, been confined chiefly to the county which 
hears its name, and the immediate confines of 
those adjoining, in the southwest of England. Nor 
does extraordinary attention appear to have been 
given to the improvement of 'he breed until the 
latter part of the last century, when the high prices, 
and great consumption of native beef in Great 
Britain, to feed her armies, having fearfully 
drained her cattle districts, awakened the atten¬ 
tion of the few breeders of Devonshire, who still 
held their cattle in their original purity of blood, 
to their extraordinary value. The northern part 
of that county appears to have been their favored 
home. The soil and climate eminently suited 
them, and with the care and attention bestowed 
upon them by their breeders, for the past sixty 
or seventy years, they have improved in quality, 
appearance, and blood-like style, until they can be 
mistaken for no others with which they have any 
relation. The wild deer of our forests have no 
stronger marks of original descent than the well- 
bred Devons of the present day ; and in uniformity 
of appearance, and identity of blood, they are 
'scarcely more homogeneous. 
An idea has prevailed to a considerable extent, 
that the red cattle of New England are essentially 
Devons, from the fact, that the first settlers of 
Plymouth came from Devonshire. There is no 
sort of proof in that, for no cattle were imported 
into New England until four years after the arrival 
of the Mayflower, and neat cattle were imported 
from all parts of the coast of England to the new 
colonies when an active communication had be¬ 
come established bei ween the two countries. At all 
events, the New England red cattle are exceed¬ 
ingly unlike the well-bred Devons of the present 
time, and only resemble them so far as their ap¬ 
proach to the same color-, sprightliness of action, 
and an upturned horn are an indication. Anocca- 
easional well-bred Devon may have been imported 
into New England during the last century, and 
left an infusion of its blood in certain neighbor¬ 
hoods; but nothing like an established herd of the 
kind has been known there until within the last 
thirty years. The first animals—six heifers and a 
hull—of pure North Devon stock, in the United 
States, of which particular note has been taken, 
were imported by Mr. Robert Patterson, into Bal¬ 
timore, Maryland, in the year 1817. A few more 
were imported into New York, by the late dis¬ 
tinguished statesman, Rufus King, of Jamaica, 
Long Island, about the year 1819—both from the 
fine herd of the late Earl of Leicester, then Mr, 
Coke, of Holkam, in the county of Norfolk, Eng¬ 
land A few years afterwards, some of Mr. Pat¬ 
terson’s stock were taken into Connecticut, and 
successfully bred. In 1835, the remainder of the 
Patterson stock went into the hands of Mr. George 
Patterson, of Sykesvplle, Maryland, who has 
skillfully bred them, with occasional importations 
of a fresh hull, up to the present time. Mr. King 
bred his stock, occasionally parting with an odd 
animal, until his death many years ago, when his 
heid was broken up and dispersed. These were 
all well-bred cattle, originally procured in Devon¬ 
shire by Mr. Coke, who considered them admirably 
adapted to the light soil of his extensive estates in 
Norfolk Froir the her- 1 the Messrs. Patter¬ 
son, many animals were distributed into various 
parts of the country. About ten years ago, and 
since, at various times, several enterprizingcattle 
breeders made selections from the best herds in 
Devonshire, and brought them into Massachusetts, 
New-York, Georgia, and the Canadas. They have 
been eminently successful here, and now several 
herds exist; of purity in blood, and high quality— 
not excelled, even in England. The Devons have 
thus become an established breed of cattle in the 
United States, and in Canada. 
DESCRIPTION. 
The pure North Devon is medium in size, and 
less than the short-horn, or Hereford. They are 
red in color—originally, a deep blood red, but lat¬ 
terly, they have in England bred them of a lighter 
shade, but still a red—a fancy shade, merely, the 
other characteristics remaining the same. The 
head is short, broad, and remarkably fine, with a 
quick, lively, prominent eye—encircled with an 
orange colored ring ; and a slender, branching, up¬ 
turned horn. The neck is fine, with little tendency 
to dewlap ; the chest full, with a slanting shoul¬ 
der, more open of late than formerly ; a straight 
hack, with full round ribs, well thrown towards 
the hips, and a projecting brisket. The loin and 
hips are broad and level ; the rumps in good pro¬ 
portion, and the tail well set, round, and tapering 
like a drumstick into a tuft of mixed white hairs 
at the end. The flanks are deep, and level; the 
thighs somewhat rounding above, and running 
into a graceful taper at the hock, with a leg below 
of surpassing fineness and strength. The fore¬ 
arm is large above the knee, but below, the leg is 
exceedingly fine and muscular. A patch of white 
is occasionally found at the udder, and in rare in¬ 
stances extending forward to the navel, but in a 
majority of cases, perhaps, the white does not 
occur. Taken altogether, no animal of the cattle 
race exists, which in uniformity of color, style, 
symmetry, and blood-like appearance exceeds the 
Devon. 
AS A BF.EF PRODUCING ANIMAL, 
no creature of the race an this side the Atlantic 
equals it in fineness of grain, delicacy of flavor, 
and economy in consumption. Its fineness of 
bone, and freedom from offal make it a favorite 
with the butchers, and a choice to the consumer. 
In England it is preferred to any other beef except¬ 
ing only the Galloway and Highland Scot, and 
bears, excepting those, the highest price in her > 
markets. He maturesearly—hardly so early, per¬ 
haps, as a Short Horn—but at four years old is 
fully ripe for the shambles, and at three, good. He 
is a kind and quick feeder, with finely marbled, 
and juicy flesh, and no bullock makes better prooj 
at the shambles. 
AS A WORKING OX, 
he excels, according to weight and size, any other 
known. Even in size, the ox is full medium, his 
solidity of carcass and muscular strength amply 
compensating for his apparent deficiency in bulk. 
For activity, intelligence, and docility he has no 
equal, and long experience has proved that where 
working oxen are in demand, an infusion of Devon 
blood adds largely to their value, both in price 
and performance of labor. They match readily, 
both in color and t-hape, the deeply concentrated 
blood of the bull imparting his colo nmformly to 
his progeny. Their movements a-" quick and 
agile. They walk almost with the ,-idity of the 
horse, possessing both wind and bottom. In short, 
the Devon is the beau ideal of a working ox, and 
as such, will always hold a pre-eminence. 
AS A DAIRY COV , 
she is full medium, when milk is made an object 
with her. For breeding purposes solely, as with 
the Short Horn, her milking capacity has been 
too often sacrificed for the benefit of her appear¬ 
ance. Naturally the Devon is a good milker. We 
have often seen Devon cows yielding twenty four 
quarts of rich milk a day for weeks together on 
grass only, and making a corresponding weight of 
butter. They are kind, and gentle in temper, and 
with the milking quality properly cultivated, they 
are, according to their weight and consumption of 
food, equal to any others. They have so proved 
in England—we know it to be so in America; 
and coupled with the manifold excellencies of her 
stock, no cow can he more profitably kept as an 
economical animal, either in the farm dairy, or 
the village paddock. 
WHERE SHALL THE DEVON BE KEPT f 
There has been much controversy among cat¬ 
tle breeders on this point. Our Western breed¬ 
ers and graziers, although they admire their beau¬ 
ty and symmetry, contend that the Devon is too 
small for their rich lands and huge corn cribs—. 
the Short Horn is better. We will not dispute 
that conclusion, well knowing the partiality of 
good stock feeders for large size, and correspond¬ 
ing consumption of food. But for the medium, 
