ENGLISH BREEDS 129 



Indeed, it may be added that the experiments for introducing a strain 

 of Cart-horse blood have been attended with most unsatisfactory results 

 so far as the Cleveland Bay type has been concerned. 



According to the Cleveland Bay Stud-hook, which may be accepted as a 

 reliable authority upon the subject with which it deals, namely the breeding 

 of this class of horse, there exist three femilies — tlie "Dart", the "Barley 

 Harvest", and the "Hob Hill Horse", to one of which all the best and most 

 typical Cleveland Bays belong. No particulars, unless the statement 

 " pedigree missing" can be accepted as information, is forthcoming regarding 

 the first of this trio of tap-roots, but his son Agar's Rainbow, afterwards 

 known as King George the Fourth, sired some excellent stock, though the 

 date of his being foaled is not given in the Stud-hooh. The "Hob Hill 

 Horse", or, to give him his real name, "Farmer's Glory", was foaled 

 about 1798, and "Barley Harvest" a little before that period, since which 

 time the pedigrees of Cleveland Bays have been far better kept. Un- 

 fortunately, however, all the breeders of this class of horse have not taken 

 pains to keep it pure, and, moreover, the Cleveland Bay, as remarked 

 above, was a victim of experiments which contributed a good deal towards 

 his loss of prestige and popularity during a portion of the nineteenth 

 century. As a case in point, the article written by J. B. Lloyd, which is 

 published in the first number of the Royal Agricultural Society's Journal, 

 may be quoted as proving how the breed was crossed. This gentleman 

 states that about the year 1827 he "determined to try and breed some agri- 

 cultural horses with more activity and little or no diminution of strength " 

 on Cleveland lines, and for this purpose "purchased some Gloucester cart 

 mares, as clean in the legs as he could get them ". Consequently it behoves 

 intending purchasers on the look-out for pure-bred Cleveland Bays to study 

 the pedigrees of the animals which take their fancy very carefully, for 

 though it is quite possible for the evidences of cart blood to be absent in 

 some horses which inherit it, the taint is likely to appear sooner or later 

 in their stock, and money may be thrown away and time wasted in breed- 

 ing from them. 



It appears, however, that the example of Mr. Lloyd was not followed 

 by many breeders of the Cleveland Bay, and according to the Stud-book 

 of the society which has been formed to further the interests of the breed, 

 the period between the years 1851 and 1867 was a very fine one for the 

 horse. After the latter year its popularity began to dwindle somewhat, 

 probably on account, at least so it is suggested, of the increased attention 

 which was being paid to the Shire horse and Clydesdale, for though the 

 varieties in c^uestion can in no sense be regarded as rivals of the Cleveland 

 Bay in looks or adaptability for fast harness work, the fixvour with which 



Vol. I. 9 



