HISTORY OF MESSENGER. 227 



at least, and thus was able to compile a complete description of 

 the horse at every point. That description was written out more 

 than twenty years ago, and in presenting it now I will not change 

 a single word. At the time it was written, as will be seen from 

 its perusal, I had really no doubt the horse was thoroughbred. It 

 will not be charged, therefore, that the coarse traits brought out 

 in the description were influenced in any degree by a theory of 

 his breeding: 



"Messenger was a grey, that became lighter and flea-bitten 

 with age. He was fifteen hands three inches high, and for a 

 thoroughbred his appearance was coarse. He did not supply the 

 mind with an idea of beauty, but he impressed upon it a concep- 

 tion of solidity and power. His head was large and bony, with 

 a nose that had a decided Roman tendency, though not to a 

 marked degree. His nostrils were unusually large and flexible, 

 and when distended they were enormous. His eye was large, 

 full, very dark and remarkably brilliant. In this particular he 

 does not appear to have inherited the weakness of his great-grand- 

 sire, Sampson. His ear was larger than usual in the blood horse, 

 but thin and tapering and always active and expressive. The 

 windpipe was so unusually large and stood out so much as a dis- 

 tinct feature that it marred what otherwise would have been a 

 gamelike throat-latch and setting on of the head. His neck 

 was very short for a blood horse, but was not coarse and thick 

 like a bull's; neither did it rise into such an enormous crest as 

 that of his sire. It was not a bad neck in any sense, but like 

 Lexington's of our own day, it was too short to be handsome. 

 His mane and foretop were thin and light. His withers were 

 low and round, which appears to have been a family characteris- 

 tic in the male line, back for three generations at least. His 

 shoulders were heavy and altogether too upright for our ideas of 

 a race horse. His barrel was perfection itself, both for depth 

 and rotundity. His loin was well arched, broad and strong. 

 His hips and quarters were 'incomparably superior to all others. ' 

 The column of the vertebra being of unusual depth and strength, 

 gave the setting on of the tail a distinctive, but elegant character. 

 The tail was carried in fine style; like the mane, it was not in 

 superabundant quantity, but there was no such scantiness as to 

 detract from the beauty and grace of the animal. His stifles 

 were well spread and swelling, but there appears to have been no 

 unusual development at this point. From the stifle to the hock 



