THE IMPROVED LINCOLNSHIRE DRAY-HORSH. 113 
shoulders too far forward, hind quarters middling, but rather high about 
the hips, legs round, and short in the pastern, deep barrelled, and full in 
the flank. Here, perhaps, lies much in the merit of these horses, for we 
know from observation and experience that all deep-bellied horses carry 
their food long, and consequently are able to stand a longer and harder 
day’s work.” This variety is now quite extinct; the improved Suffolk is 
lighter and quicker than the old breed, with a low powerful shoulder, and 
very drooping croup. The legs also are very clean and wiry. <A good 
example will be found in the engraving, drawn by Mr. Harrison Weir 
from a celebrated prizeholder at the agricultural shows of 1859. 
The Suffolk now shares with the Clydesdale pretty equally the appro- 
bation of the farmers throughout Great Britain, the former being generally 
preferred in the south, and the latter in the north. It is supposed, how- 
ever, by many breeders of experience that the northern horse is gradually 
gaining on his competitor, and that in the course of a few years the 
Suffolk will be as scarce as the dray-horse. On the other hand, his 
admirers maintain that no other horse is so hardy, and that he will do 
more work in the same time, and on the same amount of food, than any 
other. The testing of such a matter is not so simple as it may appear, for 
it would be necessary to try the experiment with a number of horses of 
each kind, and carry it on for months together. A less severe and 
complete trial would be of little use, and could not by any means be con- 
sidered as definitive, nor would it be so even conducted as I have said it 
ought to be unless it was under the actual superintendence of unpreju- 
diced observers. 
THE IMPROVED LINCOLNSHIRE DRAY-HORSE. 
ABOUT THE SAME TIME the farmers of Lincolnshire were employed in 
producing, partly for their own heavy clay lands, but chiefly for the use 
of the London drays, a large and magnificently-shaped animal, generally 
known as the Dray-Horse. Many of these stand from seventeen to 
eighteen hands high, with bodies of enormous girth, and legs, if not in 
proportion, yet of greater size than in other breeds. 
They are the produce of a cross between the old English black and the 
Flemish horse ; but the former had previously increased in size and sub- 
stance, from the nature of the grasses of the district, which seem peculiarly 
adapted to develop the growth of this animal. Unfortunately, both sire 
and dam are slow, and the produce, from its increased bulk, is rendered 
still slower, being wholly unfit for agricultural operations in competition 
with the Suffolk or the Clydesdale horses, and only well adapted to move 
heavy brewers’ drays, which cannot from their weight be expected to travel 
very rapidly. Even here, however, a quicker horse is rapidly displacing 
him, and, except in a few of the old established breweries, the true dray- 
horse is now rarely seen. Thirty years ago in a walk along Cheapside 
and Cornhill, two or three teams of splendid dray-horses were certain 
to be found ; but now we may often go from one end of the city to the 
other without seeing one. The spring-van, with its heavy machiners, has 
monapolized ail the cartage but that of the heaviest barrels, and the dray- 
horse is gradually going out of use. As these horses can only be reared on 
rich pastures, they are bred in a very limited locality, and are sold, at two 
years old, at an average of about 40/. a- -piece to the farmers within a short 
distance of London, some few of whom in Wiltshire and Berkshire breed 
them themselves, ‘Whether obtained by breeding or purchase they work 
52 
