756 REVIEW-BREEDS OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 
and his different races. We will pass over the long but in-terest- 
ing account of the two former. 
The Bos Taurus has been domesticated from the earliest records 
of human society. From the earliest period his patient docility has 
been devoted to the service of man. He bore their burdens—he 
tilled the earth—he was the medium of traffic—his flesh was per¬ 
mitted to be eaten under certain restrictions, and his image was 
stamped on the coin of the country. He was an object of adoration 
among the people of the east, and he entered largely into the my¬ 
thological systems of Greece and Rome. From his docility and his 
usefulness a certain respect was and still continues to be paid to him. 
The Jewish law forbad to muzzle the ox when he trod out the corn. 
Much real humanity entered into the feelings of the Roman agri¬ 
culturist with respect to his docile assistant. The length of the 
furrow was limited to 120 paces, and a little time for breathing was 
allowed at the end of each furrow^. The yoke was required by the 
rustic law to be shifted at each turning, that the beast should not 
be galled. Wantonly to destroy an ox was considered as a capital 
crime, and the criminal dealt with accordingly. The Celtic nations 
possessed the same sentiments, mixing deeply with their religious 
feelings. 
The author traces the history of the ox and the cow amidst a 
variety of nations. The feeling of humanity which he evinces is 
highly creditable to him, and he most satisfactorily proves that 
reason and justice should teach us to avoid the infliction of un¬ 
necessary pain on this, or, in fact, on any other animal. 
He now turns from the oxen of distant countries to those whose 
economical uses are so important in the civilized portions of Europe. 
They have all the common characters which we assign to them as a 
species, but they differ materially in their temperament, form, and uses, 
according to the physical condition of the countries in which they 
are reared, and the artificial treatment to which they are subjected. 
Wherever food is abundant, the ox becomes enlarged in bulk; 
wherever food is deficient, his size and strength become less. Art, 
by supplying cultivated food, may remedy the effects of occasional 
scarcity; but the larger breeds are always formed in countries of 
abundant herbage. In the British Island this law is strongly 
marked. On the more elevated and barren parts of the country, the 
oxen are of small stature; but their form becomes enlarged when, 
in lower and richer ground, some artificial food is added to the natural. 
Thus it is that the ox of the Sutherland mountains, and he of the 
Yorkshire vales, present to the eye such a difference of size and 
form, that we might almost hold them to be distinct species. 
There are two general classes of breeds, dependent on their being 
inhabitants of the mountains or the plains—the less fertile and the 
richer countries. According to this we may class them from the 
