406 



THE FARMER'S MAGAZINE. 



purchase everything at a cheap rate, forgetting that in 

 nine cases out of ten what is cheap must be bad. The 

 inevitable result of this cheapening, bargain-seeking 

 spirit is fraud and imposture. The evil produces its 

 own infallible retribution. We should be wrong, there- 



fore, if we relied upon legislation alone for a remedy 

 which must originate with ourselves. Resolve to buy 

 the best of everything, and to pay a fair price for it. 

 Fraud will then soon be driven from the field, and 

 honesty and fair trading will deservedly triumph. 



THE BREED AND SHAPE OF A CART-HORSE, 



"Agricultural societies are to be blamed very much 

 for the little attention they pay to horses as compared 

 with other stock, especially poultry. They ought to 

 give liberal prizes to the best brood mares and stallions 

 of all breeds, and pay as much attention to them — they 

 deserve more— as to cattle. The best stallion should 

 have to travel within the district of the society daring 

 next season, and not to receive the prize until the end 

 of that time. I must add that our great landlords 

 generally overlook the interest of their tenants, and 

 consequently their own also, in not keeping good 

 thoroughbred stallions, of different breeds, for the 

 use of their tenants at a nominal charge. Farmers 

 themselves also overlook their own interest too often by 

 being ' penny wise and pound foolish,' in looking more 

 at the fee of the horse, when they engage him, than at 

 his shape." At the risk of being considered, perhaps, a 

 little too "horsey" in our tone, we have continued to im- 

 press this now for many years past. It was too palpably 

 a weak place to be passed over, and we commenced our 

 strictures accordingly on those representative bodies 

 which only appeared to the more neglect the evil as 

 the greater it grew. It is not so very long since that 

 the Royal Agricultural Society quite despaired of ever 

 getting together a good show of horses, and so reduced 

 its premiums proportionately ! This section of tbe 

 meeting has, however, gradually improved, by the 

 adoption of an exactly contrary course. The prizes 

 in the different classes of horses have been considerably 

 extended, and as a consequence the entry is coming to 

 be a highly creditable one. It is, indeed, by this, one 

 of the chief attractions of the occasion. 



We have very recently dwelt on the demand for good 

 riding stock, and the more than indifference with 

 which the farmers have prepared to meet it. There may 

 be some showing for this. Many steady-going people 

 have a positive dread of galloping horses, while the out- 

 lay they think would be hardly warranted by the hazard 

 and uncertainty of the business. A man, then, might 

 be a little careless as to how he bred his one hackney- 

 colt or so. But the most extraordinary thing is that, 

 as a rule, he scarcely takes any more trouble with his 

 cart-horses. The observations we have quoted at the 

 opening of this article are taken from a paper recently 

 read to the members of the Much Wenlock Farmers' 

 Club, on the principles which should guide the farmer 

 in breeding stock. We give this in full in another 

 place. Mr. Griffith Evans, its author, adverts more 

 particularly to the breeding of horses, and especially 

 to those intended for agricultural purjjoses. He 

 includes la his " blame," certainly, the little atten- 



tion that is given either by our societies, landlords, 

 or tenants to horses of all kinds; but the emphasis 

 of this complaint rests on the culpable carelessness 

 with which the farmer treats the breeding of farm- 

 horses. Mr. Evans stands by no means alone here. 

 Many gentlemen have said this before now, 

 and some almost in the same words. Mr. Bar- 

 thropp, for instance, so deservedly famous for his Suf- 

 folks, expressed his regret at the Central Club a few 

 years since, that "farmers did not pay more attention in 

 selecting horses for their mares, instead, as is too often 

 the case, pursuing that penny-wise-pound-foolish sys- 

 tem of putting all their mares to one horse, perhaps 

 an inferior animal, merely for the sake of saving trouble 

 and a little expense. They did not take into cont-idera- 

 tion the relative form of the mare and the horse, or 

 judge whether they suited each other — a want of sys- 

 tem almost certain to result in disappointment." It is 

 noticeable that in condemning this ill-considered eco- 

 nomy Mr. Evans and Mr. Barthropp both make use of 

 the same phrase, and characterise it, justly enough, as 

 "penny wise and pound foolish." 



Although we already hear of agriculturists who, thanks 

 to Mr. Smith or Mr. Fowler, have reduced their teams 

 to at least one-half their previous strength, a clever 

 cart colt will always command his price in the market. 

 Railways have not even yet put machiners and hunters 

 quite out of date, and the draught-horse will ever have 

 his uses. Notwithstanding, moreover, the too common 

 neglect he has experienced, we have wonderfully im- 

 proved in our estimate of what a cart-horse should be. 

 By this we may be considered to have altogether out- 

 lived our veneration for the old orthodox Blackbird 

 sort, with his hairy heels, his sour head, his upright 

 shoulder, and sluggish pace. We combine strength 

 with activity ; and whether it be the Lincoln, the 

 Suffolk, or the Clydesdale, we must have something 

 that can not merely pull, but step. And here we are 

 rather inclined to join issue with Mr. Evans. It ap- 

 pears that so far back as the year 1830, a writer in 

 " that excellent journal" the Farmer's Magazine, ad- 

 vocated the same oblique shoulderfor the draught as for 

 the liackney horse. This Mr. Evans terms "a most igno- 

 rantly absurd and grossly fallacious doctrine." And he 

 goes on to say " the proper shape of the draught hoi-se, 

 in contradistinction to the saddle horse, should be a low 

 and thick forehand and withers. The shoulder should bo 

 comparatively upright, and consequently the lino 

 drawn vertically from the point of the shoulder will 

 fall considerably in front of the toe. The draught 

 horse should, as the saying is, 'stand over his legs,' 



