Page:The Evolution of British Cattle.djvu/115

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THE DUTCH SUPREMACY
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imported Dutch cattle in the seventeenth century—it must have been before 1671, for he died then—indicate that Dutch cattle may have been brought to the west coast almost as early as to the east. It may be doubted, however, whether the eastern and the western conquests were exactly alike. On the east coast the Dutch invaders seized the land almost for themselves alone, while in the midlands and in the west it was rather an amalgamation of the invader and the invaded. The cattle on the east retained the characteristics they had brought with them from Holland, and acquired no others, while the cattle in the midlands and west eventually acquired characteristics drawn from both Dutch and British sources. The cattle of Hereford and some neighbouring districts acquired their red colour from their Anglo-Saxon ancestors, and their size and their white faces and underlines from Holland; while the midland and Lancashire cattle—the Longhorns—acquired their size and white back-stripe from Holland, and their various colours—red, yellow, mulberry, plum, dun, the brindles, and so on—from the red cattle in the south of their territory and the Celtic and other cattle in the north. It is also highly probable that the long and peculiarly shaped horns of the Longhorns are a direct or indirect—perhaps both—legacy from the cattle brought to Britain by the Romans.