INTRODUCTORY n 



be the infusion of a large amount of pure and fresh 

 Arab blood of the desert breed. 



Notwithstanding the affected and adventitious 

 worship of the English thoroughbred — it has almost 

 become a religion — there is at bottom a nearly 

 universal consensus of opinion as to his sad deterio- 

 ration, and as to the cause of his deterioration. The 

 opinion of one or two gentlemen might not be 

 accepted, but on these points it is nearly every- 

 body's opinion. The most sanguine and fanatic 

 thoroughbred supporters hardly venture to affirm 

 the contrary. I can find hardly a single man who 

 does. They will tell you that the best horses are 

 as good as ever, which I doubt. They may be as 

 fast for short distances ; the very statement that 

 the best horses are as good as ever is pregnant 

 with the admission that the general run is de- 

 teriorated, and that the breed, as a breed, is being 

 ruined. And in the face of such opinions as I 

 shall quote it would be foolish for the general 

 horse-breeder to be further carried away by the 

 * thoroughbred cult ' without making inquiry. The 

 authorities I shall cite on this are irrefragable, and 

 if there were any who pretended that the thorough- 

 bred had not deteriorated before the Transvaal War, 

 they have had to admit since that war that they 

 were wrong. The Boers, mounted on their Arab 

 ponies, laughed at the pick of our English and 

 Australian horses, and literally ran rings around 

 them. I have two sons who, with my consent, 



