INTRODUCTION. 135 



tioned cannot have been considerable, if, according 

 to the venerable Bede, the insular Saxons did not 

 begin to ride much before the year 630. Athelstan 

 is the first on record who, in 930, received German 

 running-horses as a present from abroad, and there- 

 fore had more particular opportunity of improving 

 the English stock by the infusion of select foreign 

 blood : these presents came from Hugh the Great, * 

 when he solicited the Saxon king's sister in mar- 

 riage ; and he seems to have bestowed some attention 

 on the subject, since he issued a decree prohibiting 

 the exportation of horses without his licence ; and 

 the order proves that his steeds were already suffi- 

 ciently valuable to incur the risk and expense of ship- 

 ping them for the continental fairs. In a document of 

 the year 1 000, we find the relative value of horses 

 in this kingdom, directing, if a horse was de- 

 stroyed or negligently lost, the compensation to be 

 demanded was thirty shillings; a mare or colt, 

 twenty shillings ; a mule or young ass, twelve shil- 

 lings ; an ox, thirty pence ; a cow, twenty-four 

 pence ; a pig, eight pence ; and a man, one pound ! 

 In the laws of Hyweldda, sovereign of Wales, 

 dated a few years before this period, a foal not four- 



* We derive the facts of this and the following paragraphs 

 from a treatise on " The Horse," published under the superin- 

 tendence of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, 

 1 vol. 8vo. 1831. The text says Hugh Capet by mistake; it 

 was Hugh the Great, father of Capet, who married, in second 

 nuptials, Ethilda, daughter of Edward the elder, and sister of 

 Athelstan. 



