BREEDING. 21 



Ti€ver exceeded thirteen hands, though got by 

 Marsk, (who was a large horse) out of a 

 full-sized hackney mare in the neighbour- 

 hood af Windsor; as well as a v^ry large, 

 bony, handsome, useful gelding full fifteen 

 hands, out of u poney mare, under tivelvCy 

 that y/as bought of a troop of gipsies near 

 Basingstoke for a single guinea. An in- 

 creased list of such instances might be eatsily 

 formed and equally authenticated ; but these 

 are sufficient to encounter the assertions of 

 those who setm firmly to believe the im- 

 practicability of obtaining bone^ size^ or 

 strength, but from horses and mares of such 

 size and bone only ; and although it is cer- 

 tainly right to admit the probability of de- 

 viation from sire and dam in such cases, yet 

 the minute investigation of causes must lead 

 us into a field of physical reasoning, and ana- 

 tomical disquisition, that would prove in 

 general reading too remote and extensive for 

 the subject before us. 



There are, however, very just and fair 

 reasons to be adduced, why these contrasts 

 so frequently occur in opposition to the es- 

 tablished notions of breeding, without at all 



