106 THE HOUSE OF AMERICA, 



ward for nearly one hundred years before the first English race 

 horse was imported for their improvement. Their regular racing 

 was at all distances, up to four miles. 



4. On this basis of the native English blood, common to both 

 countries, the breed of English and American race horses was 

 built up. The foreign elements brought into England were 

 chiefly from the Barbary States and from Turkey. This exotic 

 blood certainly had a very marked effect upon the horse stock of 

 Britain, but it cannot be said, with certainty, that it increased 

 the speed of the race horse. All the experiences of the past 

 hundred years with these foreign strains have gone to show that 

 instead of increasing the speed they have retarded it. 



5. The list of the foundation stock of the English race horse as 

 given by Mr. Weatherby, in the first volume of the English Stud 

 Book, and reproduced in the preceding chapter, is worthy of very 

 careful study, especially by those who seem to think that the 

 English race horse is descended, without admixture, from the 

 Arabian horse. The striking feature of that list is the overwhelm- 

 ing preponderance of other blood than the Arabian, even if we 

 accept all that is called Arabian as genuine. Mr. Parley's horse, 

 called an Arabian, and Lord Godolphin's horse, called an Arabian, 

 count for more than all the others put together, in the make-up 

 of the English race horse. Mr. Darley's horse came from a region 

 remote from Arabia and where a thousand good horses are bred 

 for one in Arabia, and should be called a Turk. Lord Godol- 

 phin's horse "the great unknown" will ever remain unknown. 

 He seems to have been traced to France, and, after studying his 

 portraiture, it is probable he was a French horse. 



6. Taking this list of foundation stock and viewing it from the 

 standpoint of the greatest lenity and liberality that a sound and 

 careful judgment can accord, we find that the inheritance of 

 Arabian blood in the veins of the English race horse, if there was 

 any such inheritance at all, was strictly infinitesimal. This 

 historical fact in the foundation of the race horse, showing the 

 inutility of Arabian blood, whether genuine or spurious, has 

 been fully confirmed in great multitudes of trials, in both nations, 

 during the past hundred years. In no case has it been a benefit, 

 but always a detriment. 



7. The race horse has been bred through centuries for the 

 single purpose of speed. Through all his generations he has 



