430 Missouri Agricidtural Report. 



As to the draft horse, the choice of breeds is wide, but by all 

 means follow popularity in breed and do not be led to experiment 

 with any variety which has not that indispensable recommendation. 

 The popular varieties today in America are the Percherons and the 

 Belgians ; the Shires and the Clydes are approved in some quarters ; 

 the Suffolks are attractive, but not as yet in sufficient numbers to 

 establish a reputation. Percherons and Belgians, both stand heat 

 well; are clean-legged; not specially given to developing sidebones 

 or ringbones — those banes of the city work horse; are active and 

 nimble, handle themselves well on slippery or icy pavements; are 

 good doers, of true draft type, and breed true enough to that type 

 to make it easy among either clean-bred or grades, to match up 

 pairs without much trouble, and even to fill a large stable with 

 horses, any two of which will make a good pair. They "wear them- 

 selves" well in harness, are attractive, intelligent, bold, and what- 

 ever their bulk, surprisingly active, while they earn their keep at 

 labor at an amazingly early age, and (when not overworked) to 

 their great personal advantage. You would be, as I was, amazed 

 to know how many three-year-old grades are working regularly in 

 heavy trucks in all our cities. I was judging a class of some 

 twenty pairs of these amiable behemoths at a New York show, and 

 chancing to notice that one horse was only a three-year-old, I im- 

 mediately examined the whole class and found that of the forty 

 animals competing in this event for "draft pairs in harness," no 

 less than 16 were three-year-olds, although I learned that the 

 owners had bought them that spring for four years old. All our 

 draft horses are considered by foreigners very light in bone, and 

 consequently in appearance greatly overtopped. This is a just 

 criticism — they are, if any definite arbitrary rule for measurement 

 below knees and hocks exist — which it does not. The foreigners 

 themselves are breeding them "light under the knee" compared to 

 old time specimens, and no one can prove that they are wrong so 

 to do; or that our horses, often sadly deficient, suffer, for practical 

 purposes, from any so-called lightness of the shank bones. The 

 truth is that no characteristic of the horse has been so unneces- 

 sarily insisted upon as large bone. Everyone says it is essential 

 and proper, but no one can prove it. As personal opinion, or as a 

 tradition, the claim has whatever weight any individual may choose 

 to give it, but nothing more. Think of the spindle-shanks you 

 have seen carry a huge bulk unfailingly for years; remember the 

 almost perfect legs you have seen go wrong in a few months. The 



