ities in races of stock "has sometimes been taken even in little-civilised districts, where we should least have expected it, as in the case of the niata, chivo, and hornless cattle in South America." These facts indicate that in the earliest historic times selection in the breeding of cattle had been practised with considerable skill. Along with other known circumstances, they also seem to justify the conclusion that almost ever since cattle were thoroughly domesticated and fitted for the uses of man, they have been submitted to some kind of selection, perhaps in remote ages more rude than skilled, but still sufficient to stamp with permanency such an exceptional character as the absence of horns.

Polled varieties of cattle have been more widely spread than is generally supposed. No traces have been discovered of the existence of any polled cattle prior to the historic era-although, as we have already remarked, an occasional hornless animal may even then have appeared. Then, as far as we are aware, no reference to polled cattle is made by any of the early writers excepting Herodotus, who describes the domestic cattle of the Scythians as having been hornless. But passing to more recent times, say within the past two hundred years, we gather from sufficiently reliable evidence that, in the British Isles and elsewhere, a great many varieties of polled cattle have existed. A number of these varieties have disappeared, but several still survive. It is known that on the estate of Prince Leichtenstein in Austria a herd of red polled cattle has been in existence from time immemorial; and we are told by Darwin that in Paraguay in South America a variety of hornless cattle originated little more than a hundred years ago. The latter case Darwin, in his communication to us, mentions as the only instance he had ever come across in which the origin and formation of a polled race were fully known. In his work on Animals and Plants under Domestication,' he states (and he takes

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his information from Azara, the author of 'Des Quadrupeds du Paraguay'), that amongst a horned race a polled bull had been born in 1770, and that, having been preserved, the animal founded a hornless breed. There are also polled cattle in Norway; while Dr Uno von Troil, writing in 1772, says Iceland is "well provided with cattle which are generally without horns."

It is not necessary to state all that is known regarding the many varieties of polled cattle that have at one time or other existed in the British Isles. It will suffice to mention where the more important have been found. Several of the herds of semi-wild cattle which existed in the parks around the seats of country gentlemen in England and Scotland early in the present century, but which have now, with two or three exceptions, wholly disappeared, were destitute of horns. At Somerford Park, in Cheshire, England, there has existed from time immemorial a pure herd of white polled cattle. Writing of this herd in 1875, the late Rev. John Storer said it then numbered twenty head; that it was of great though unknown antiquity, having been at Somerford Park for several hundred years; that it had undoubtedly been at first derived from the wild herds of South Lancashire; and that it had been long domesticated, but was probably the best representative extant of the hornless and tame variety of the original wild white breed. The semi-wild herd "of unknown origin but great antiquity" which was formerly kept at Wollaton Hall, Nottinghamshire, England, becoming extinct nearly sixty years ago, was without horns; as also were a similar herd at Whalley Abbey, Lancashire, which is said to have been transferred to Gisburne Park, Yorkshire, where it remained till about twenty-five or thirty years ago; and another at Middleton Hall, Lancashire. Dr Charles Leigh, in his work on the 'Natural History of Lancashire and the Peak of Derbyshire,' published in 1700, mentions the Middleton Hall herd, and presumes that the

cattle had first been brought there from the Highlands of Scotland, although he does not state the grounds upon which that assumption was based. According to Mr Storer, this herd was in 1765 transferred to Gunton Park in Norfolk, where it existed till some thirty-five or forty years ago, having thrown off several branches which are still represented by polled herds, at Blinkling, Woodbastwick, Brooke Hall, and other places in Norfolk.

In other districts in England there would seem to have been races of polled cattle which have long ago disappeared. Youatt, writing nearly fifty years ago, says, "The Devonshire nats, or polled cattle, now rapidly decreasing in number, possess the general figure and most of the good qualities of the horned beasts of the district;" while, in reference to the "Northern or Yorkshire polled cattle," or "Yorkshire polls," he says, they "are almost as large as the horned beasts of that county, and as good for grazing and for the pail. Many breeders pay particular attention to the shape of the head of these polled cattle, and to a certain extent also in the horned ones."

Passing into Scotland, we have several extinct as well as two living races of polled cattle to note. The herd of wild white cattle which existed at Ardrossan Park, Ayrshire, for centuries, and became extinct about 1820, is described as having been originally horned, but latterly polled. Then it is clearly established that the Duke of Hamilton's celebrated herd of semi-wild cattle, which has existed at Cadzow Park, Lanarkshire, from the remotest antiquity, although now horned, was formerly polled. This latter curious and significant circumstance is authenticated by the facts, that there is in preservation the skeleton of a Cadzow ox showing the animal to have been hornless, and that at the show of the Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland at Glasgow in 1844, two polled specimens of the Cadzow herd were exhibited.

From a very peculiar source we have interesting testi

mony of the existence of polled cattle in the Western Highlands of Scotland more than a hundred years ago. Dr Samuel Johnson, in his published account of the journey which he and Boswell, his faithful follower, made through the Western Islands of Scotland in 1773, says: "The cattle of Skye are not so small as is commonly believed. Since they have sent their beeves in great numbers to southern markets, they have probably taken more care of their breed. Of their black cattle, some are without horns, called by the Scots humble cows, as we call a bee humble that wants a sting. Whether this difference be specific or accidental, though we inquired with great diligence, we could not be informed. We are not very sure that the bull is ever without horns, though we have been told that such bulls there are. What is produced by putting a horned and unhorned male and female together no man has ever tried that thought the result worthy of observation." When or how the polled cattle of Skye became extinct, we unfortunately know nothing, for the earlier writers on agricultural matters in the north of Scotland, as elsewhere, describe cattle so generally, that any reference to such points as horns is very rare.

Pennant has left us interesting notes on his tours in Scotland during the years 1769, 1772, and 1773, but only in a few isolated cases does he give a minute description of the cattle he had seen. He travelled through Sutherlandshire in 1769, and he tells us that it is "a country abounding in cattle, and sends out annually 2500 head, which sold at this time [August 1769] (lean) at from £2, 10s. to £3 per head. They are very frequently without horns, and both they and the horses are very small." Of the Sutherlandshire polled cattle we have also lost all trace. In other parts of Scotland, polled strains which are now extinct would seem to have existed in former times, but we have mentioned the more important varieties known

to us.

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It is well known that, although the native breeds of Ireland are now horned, there was at one time a polled race in that country. The most interesting and valuable testimony of this fact is the following extract from a review of a work on agriculture which appeared in the Irish Farmers' Gazette' in August 1847. The reviewer says: A relative of our own, deceased a few years ago at the age of 114, had polled cattle in Ireland, and stated that the same breed had been in possession of his great-grandfather over 200 years before our informant was born. These cattle were chiefly black, and black and white on the back; occasionally red, and brindled with white stripes; in some cases all white but the ears, which were red; and he believed there was never any intermixture of English or Scotch blood amongst them for the period he alluded to. They possessed the characters of being great milkers and good butter-producers."

At the present time three distinct and well-defined breeds of polled cattle exist in the United Kingdom. Two, the Aberdeen or Angus, and the Galloway breeds, have their headquarters in Scotland; and the third, the Norfolk and Suffolk, in England. The first forms the subject proper of this volume. As to the others, a few sentences here may be of interest. There is hardly any doubt that the polled Galloway cattle are the direct but modified descendants of the horned race that formerly occupied the old Galloway district, which comprised an extensive tract of valuable grazing-land in the south-west of Scotland. According to Youatt, the "greater part" of the Galloway cattle were horned-some had medium horns and some were polled-about the middle of the eighteenth century; while Dr Bryce Johnstone, in his view of the agriculture of Dumfries, written in 1794, George Culley (who died in 1813 in his 79th year), in his works on live stock, and Aiton, Smith, and Singer, in their views of the agriculture of Ayrshire, Galloway, and Dumfriesshire, pub