PRACTICAL EXPERIMENTS. Ill 



cerned ; but it brought forcibly to my mind a remark that 

 Professor Agassiz made to me a few years before his death, 

 which was this : that he had noticed, that, if a mare was 

 covered in the first instance by a scrub, the whole of her 

 future progeny were scrubs, no matter how highly bred the 

 horse was. He said that this applied not merely to horses, 

 but the same rule held good in the bovine race ; that if a 

 cow was covered in the first instance by a mean, unworthy 

 sire, her future progeny, no matter by what bull she was 

 covered, partook of the mean character of the first sire : a 

 hifrh-bred calf could not be had. The same rule, Professor 

 Agassiz said, held good with the dog, and with other animals. 

 This, I am aware, is a nut for scientists to crack; but it 

 is certainly worthy of the observation of all breeders of 

 stock, or animals of any kind. 



Mr. Williams of Waltham. If there are no more ques- 

 tions to be asked in regard to the shoeing of horses, there is 

 a question I want to ask the essayist ; and that is, whether, 

 if I wish to repeat the qualities of either sire or dam, one 

 more than the other, there is any way by which I can do so ; 

 if, for instance, by putting the male into a state of excite- 

 ment, if I wished to repeat the male, and keeping the mare 

 in a state of perfect quiet at the time of service, I should be 

 more likely to repeat the male in the progeny, or vice versa^ 

 if I wished to repeat the female. 



Mr. Russell. That question has been very often raised. 

 A great deal has been said upon it ; and there are instances, 

 on record in which breeders have experimented in that way. 

 There was a case in which Sir Tatton Sykes, a distinguished 

 English breeder, wished to perpetuate the qualities of 

 a horse called " Muley-Moloch," a celebrated race-horse. 

 He and his stud-keeper brought out the mare, and kept 

 the horse for half or three-quarters of an hour in the pres- 

 ence of the mare, and walking about her; and they con- 

 tended and believed that the progeny of that cover embodied 

 the highest qualities of the horse. That was a case in which 

 the two animals were of equal lineage, and probably of equal 

 powers. The mare was one of the very first of her class of 

 English thorough-bred mares; and the horse was, perhaps, 

 the very best horse of his day in England as a sire, so that 

 the proof might have been good in that case ; but if the horse 



