36 THE ARAB THE HORSE OF THE FUTURE 



Even ' Cecil,' who published a rather famous book 

 on the stud-farm, and is decidedly a friend of the 

 thoroughbred, and who maintains, on the whole, the 

 non-degeneration xheory, says (1873) that in every 

 district ' the most unsound, weedy wretches go the 

 circuit,' and that roaring is an infirmity that has 

 increased of late years amongst thoroughbred horses 

 rather extensively ; that there were not so many 

 inferior horses brought to the post of yore as when 

 he wrote ; that handicaps did not before then induce 

 to the cultivation and training of useless weeds ; 

 and he shows how severe training and racing impair 

 constitutions, and have a most injurious influence 

 over some animals, which in many instances they 

 never overcome. All this, and more, from an 

 advocate for non-degeneration ! And matters have 

 become worse since. 



Major Arthur Griffiths, late of the 63rd Regi- 

 ment, in his book on the English army (1878), 

 says that there is an increasing scarcity of the 

 proper kind of horses required to meet the current 

 demand. The question of their supply is yearly 

 growing into more serious proportions, and he criti- 

 cises the decision of a Committee of the House of 

 Lords not to employ Government stallions, although 

 it was not denied that the produce was already 

 deterioriating from the inferior quality of the entire 

 horses which travelled the country. Then comes 

 his reflection that to adhere too rigorously to the 

 views he combats ' is to sleep on in a fools' paradise 



