THEIR HISTORY, RISE AND PROGRESS. 375 



required oath, and the difficulty of punishing then was so 

 great, that in the Reign of Queen Elizabeth, a.d. 1562, 

 the permission to persons to take Horses abroad for their 

 own use was repealed (o). 



It was now found that in the Isle of Ely and in the 

 Counties of Cambridge, Huntingdon, Northampton, Lin- 

 coln, Norfolk and Suffolk, the fens were so wet and rotten 

 that they could not carry Stoned Horses of the size men- 

 tioned in the Act of Henry the Eighth (7;), without danger 

 of their being mired or drowned. The Horses of many 

 poor men had been seized as being beneath the statutable 

 height, and the breed of Horses and all the tillage and 

 carriage within the district had been very much hindered. 

 To remedy these evils, an Act was passed in this Reign, 

 A.D. 1565, by which the statutable height of Stoned Horses 

 in those fen Counties was reduced to thirteen hands {q) . 



We have seen that in the Reign of Philip and Mary, 

 certain forms were prescribed to give publicity to the sale 

 of Horses at Markets and Fairs, so that if the Horse had 

 been stolen, the owner might have an opportunity of claim- 

 ing it (r). But these forms seemed to have entirely failed 

 in their object, because in this Reign, Horse-stealing had 

 grown so common, that Horses were not safe in Pastures 

 or Closes, and hardly so in their Stables ; and there was 

 always a ready sale for them in distant Fairs and Markets. 

 However, in a.d. 1589, an Act was passed prescribing cer- 

 tain additional forms to be observed in sales at such places, 

 and making it a matter of greater difficulty to sell a stolen 

 Horse (s). _ This is the Act now in force, and which we 

 have already considered. 



In the Reign of James the First, an immaterial and Reign of 

 trifling alteration was made in the Law of Gaming by the ^^^^ *^^® 

 repeal of the Statute of Richard the Second in A.D. 1623 (/). 

 But an important- change took place with regard to Horse 

 Racing. Before this time, Horse Races were mere trials 

 of speed and strength, without any acknowledged system, 

 and were mixed up with other exercises of skill and activity. 

 The pastime had continued on the same footing since the 

 time of Henry the Eighth, but this Reign may be con- 

 sidered the era in which Racing began to be ranked as a 



(0) 5 Eliz. c. 19, repealed by 26 («) 31 Eliz. c. 12, Appendix ; 



& 27 Vict. c. 125. and see Stolen Horses, ante, Part 1, 



{p) 32 Hen. 8, c. 13. Chap. 3. 



(?) 8 Eliz. c. 8, repealed by 19 & (t) 21 Jac. 1, c. 28, s. 11, re- 



20 Vict. c. 64. pealed by 10 & 20 Vict. c. 64. 



(>■) 2 & 3 Ph. & M. 0. 7. 



