HISTORY OF HORSE-RACING. 33 



least for some years, until the present dreary gloom of camps, 

 campaigns, and national disquietude has given place to a renova- 

 tion of former splendour and commercial prosperity. 



A century has elapsed since the writing of the above-quoted 

 extracts, and many of the ideas therein contained may seem 

 strange to modern lovers of horses — notably the theory to which 

 we have already alluded that Ireland, owing to its damp 

 climate, cannot produce as good horses as England. 



Until fifteen years ago (if not up to the present moment) 

 the very best class of horses used for hunting hailed from the 

 Emerald Isle, and would still do so, but for three intervening 

 causes : 



First and foremost, the poverty of the land, which it is not 

 our province to discuss ; secondly, the enormous export of 

 our best brood mares from every part of Great Britain and 

 Ireland ; and, thirdly, the superabundance of thoroughbred 

 stallions. 



Added to these causes, a very considerable quantity of soft 

 bad blood has been imported into the country since the 

 Crimean war in the shape of draught animals, the mares of 

 which sort have been largely crossed with thoroughbred sires, 

 with the result of completely annihilating that strong, active, 

 and courageous half-breed of horses which, whether employed 

 for the saddle or for harness, was for general purposes second 

 to none that has ever been produced. 



The ' Cock-tail,' as this breed was commonly called, was 

 even employed in racing ; and at the beginning of the century 

 it would have been considered as great a crime to name a 

 thoroughbred horse for a cock-tail contest, in which the com- 

 petitors were required to possess an impure pedigree, as to pull 

 a horse in a race. 



Not only in Ireland, but in England also, and perhaps more 

 especially in Yorkshire, gentlemen were most proud of their 

 half-breeds ; and when clean-bred mares were mated with the 

 entire horses of this blood the results as to shape and quality 

 were excellent 



