118 THE HORSE AND HIS STABLE. [CHAP. 



In later days, in the give and take plates there, winners 

 are recorded of thirteen hands high, and the size of a stud 

 horse of fourteen hands was advertised. Now, if a horse 

 is under sixteen hands his size is not mentioned, and all 

 the world is our customer at 5000 or 6000 a horse. 

 And if more people had the skill to ride him, the merits 

 of the thorough-hred horse as a hunter would be better 

 known; though, indeed, under any circumstances, it is 

 but the sweepings of the training stable which descends 

 to the hunting field or private life. 

 All breeds The first axiom of the breeder is est in equis patrum 



result from 



natural virtus "Like produces like." But the second axiom is, 



conditions. 



" The goodness of the horse goes in at his mouth." 

 The moral is, that like produces like only under like 

 natural conditions. Turn out all the winners of the 

 last ten years to breed on Dartmoor or in Shetland ; 

 what would be the betting about a colt or a filly so bred 

 for the Derby or Oaks ? The qualities of the race- 

 horse the accumulation of thousands of years are lost 

 in the first generation. Continue to breed him under 



