PONIES AND PONY-BEEEDING 16D 



small-sized stallions of good quality into Ireland is calculated to effect 

 a very great improvement in both their appearance and value. 



The Dale or Fell Pony. — This pony is doubtless a very close 

 relation of the Westmoreland tap-root, if not identically the same animal, 

 and also resembles the Rum pony in its conformation, so that the descrip- 

 tion given of the latter may be taken as applying equally to the subject of 

 this chapter, though the Dale pony is, generally speaking, rather the more 

 breedy-looking animal of the two. At the same time, it is difficult to 

 believe that there is not some intimate relationship between them, though 

 doubtless the Dales have received more attention from north -country 

 breeders than have the Rum ponies from the Scotsmen of the west coast. 

 A very great recommendation of the Dale pony is his great stamina, as 

 some members of the variety are credited with having travelled immense 

 distances under heavy burdens; whilst the strength of their constitutions 

 is borne evidence to by the fact that they exist and flourish on the hills 

 on the borders of England and Scotland under conditions which would 

 render existence impossible in the case of most horses. Like the Rum 

 pony, the Dale pony is extremely sure-footed, and being as it were a 

 sort of half-way breed between the horse and the pony, the Fells should 

 prove acceptable additions to the establishments of those who desire to 

 possess a sturdy, useful animal of rather less stature than the ordinary 

 cob. Finally, as a proof of the antiquity and stamina of the English 

 north-country pony, it may be stated that an account is in existence of 

 a Mr. Sinclair of Kirkby-Lonsdale having, for a wager of 500 guineas, 

 ridden a Galloway 1000 miles in 1000 hours at Carlisle in the year 

 1701, the Galloway being presumably a Fell pony. 



The Rum Pony.— The association of the above name with a well- 

 known breed of ponies inhabiting the north and west of Scotland has 

 become of late years an accomplished fact, owing to the fact that almost 

 all the best specimens have been bred on the isle of Rum, whilst those 

 on the mainland have become deteriorated in quality. The former circum- 

 stance is doubtless owing to the fact that so far back as the year 1847 

 a former Lord Salisbury turned a Thoroughbred stallion out on the island; 

 but unhappily no authentic records of the ultimate fate of the horse or 

 of the produce of his sons and daughters have been forthcoming. At a 

 comparatively recent period, however, Lord Arthur Cecil purchased the 

 entire stock of island ponies, and removed them to the neighbourhood 

 of the New Forest, where doubtless their improvement will be studied 

 with ultimate benefit to the breed. 



The Rum pony is usually black in colour, and the average height 

 is between 13 hands 2 inches to 14 hands 3 inches, which proves that 



