The Horse 253 



By the height of it, indeed, one wise in land 

 lore can gauge accurately the producing 

 power of its seat. It thrives only upon deep 

 limestone clays, with plenty of humus mixed 

 through, and fat black feeding pebbles here 

 and there. Rainfall has something to do 

 with the growth of the grass. In a dry 

 season the best blue-grass pastures stand but 

 little beyond mid-leg high. Conversely a 

 very damp and forcing season may make the 

 grass upon second or even third rate land, 

 come level with the knee. Whatever the 

 height of it, in flower it is the most beautiful 

 of all grasses. Not only are the blossoms 

 delicately tinted in greenish blue, a sort of 

 pastel shade, but the blades as well have a 

 blue bloom. They are thick and fine always, 

 even when the grass grows in sparse, scat- 

 tered clumps. Close-cropped blue-grass turf 

 is like velvet, especially if it has been cropped 

 and trampled for fifty years. 



The fine feathery heads stand so thick and 

 even, when they toss in the wind it is as 

 though a misty gray-green cloud had come 

 bodily to earth, and was rippling under foot. 

 Sometimes, but very rarely, blue grass is 

 mowed. Stock breeders think it better in 

 many ways to let it cure upon the stools. 

 Ripening seed is, they admit, exhausting both 

 to the land and the grass. Notwithstanding, 



