HISTORY 



447 



"Scott Shales" (692), which infused much of the Thoroughbred 

 Arab and Barb blood, and gave fine bones, pace, and stay- 

 ing power to the heavy, round-boned, and more or less cart- 

 horse-shaped trotter of the beginning and middle of the 

 century. The original Trotter varied in size from the 

 farmer's market cob to the regular cart-horse of the country, 

 to which the Suffolk Punch is no doubt directly related. 

 There are no reasonable grounds to doubt that the free 

 action of many of our cart-horses and the action of the 

 hackney had a common origin in an early British horse. 



FIG. 27. FAULTY TROTTING ACTION. FIG. 28. PERFECT ACTION AND FORMATION. 

 From Gaivayne's Twentieth Century Book on the Horse. 



It was formerly a custom in Norfolk to trot the cart- 

 horses when returning with the empty cart or waggon a 

 fact which indicates that they were at one time lighter and 

 more active than those of the present day. Their increase in 

 weight can, however, be accounted for by the crossing which 

 took place between the original breed (described as " small, 

 brown-muzzled, and light-boned") and Lincolnshire and 

 Leicestershire Black Horses. 



Among the Yorkshire Trotters the same process ot 

 improvement was carried out about the same period. 

 Thoroughbred Arabian blood was largely used through the 



