308 WISCONSIN STATE AGRICULTURAL SOCIETY. 
many breeders of note, among them Thomas Booth and Thomas 
Bates, who commenced as breeders about the year 1800, and con¬ 
tinued in the business successfully, Thomas Bates for forty years,, 
and Thomas Booth, his sons and grandsons, down to the present 
time. 
In the early part of this century, a few pure bred short-horns 
were imported into the United States. Since then, frequent and 
quite large importations have been made, and at this time, pure 
bred herds of these very valuable animals are to be found in 
almost every state in the Union, and in the Provinces of the 
Canadas. More of them are now bred each year in Ameiica 
than in England, where they were first reared. From, this 
brief sketch of the origin and progress of short-horn cattle, 
it will be observed that for a period of nearly 200 years, at 
least, breeders have been engaged in an intelligent and patient ef¬ 
fort to make better and more profitable to the farmer one family 
or branch of neat cattle. 
In producing a better and more profitable animal, these early 
breeders, as well as those of a more recent date, have had in view,, 
early maturity, large size, a full development ot those parts of the 
animal from which the best beef is cut, and good milking quali¬ 
ties. Animals intelligently and persistently bred for these very 
desirable qualities, for a period of 200 years, must have become 
well fixed in these characteristics, and must be capable of repro¬ 
ducing them, with great certainty, in their offspring. 
Within this century, especially in the past 25 years, pure bred 
Short Horns have increased and spread over the United States 
and the Canadas very rapidly, and although they have long been 
popular, and have been owned and bred by many farmers through¬ 
out the country, their popularity and the demand for them seems 
to have increased in proportion to the increased numbers bred, 
which will be indicated to some extent by the very large prices 
paid and offered for this class of cattle, and the large numbers 
sold at public sales. 
In the preface to the 10th Yol. of the American Short Horn 
Herd Book, we learn two cows were imported into Canada in the 
year 1870, which cost in England 1,500 guineas ($7500) each, and 
several American bred cows had been sold at $3,500 to $8,000 
