THE BAY STOCK. 209 



ral sufficiently distinct, even in countries where 

 great races of difiPerent origin exist, as is quite ob- 

 vious in Great Britain, where we have at least 

 three that still retain their pristine characteristics. 

 Some there will be found of unascertainable origin, 

 but when they are likewise considered in the geo- 

 graphical spaces they occupy, and with relation to 

 the nations that have traversed them, or still reside 

 within their limits, we shall at least have approxi- 

 mating data for our purpose. Beginning with the 

 most ancient domesticated race of Western Asia 

 and Egypt, we find 



THE BAY STOCK, 



w^hich, celebrated in early antiquity, and then unno- 

 ticed for some ages, recovered its pristine celebrity 

 from the date of the hegira, and with the Islam 

 conquests spread again towards the east till it 

 reached the Bramaputra; came westward through 

 Barbary to Spain ; is now established in England ; 

 in South and North America ; and is fast rising into 

 importance in Australia. Like the Caucassian race 

 of man, it is the variety of horse which gradually 

 either obliterates all the others or assumes an indis- 

 putable pre-eminence, for from that source the most 

 beautiful and the best horses in existence are de- 

 rived. Although the stock is reared into its superior 

 characteristics by education and human interven- 

 tion, it seems more naturally confined in pre-emi- 

 nence within the twentieth and thirty-sixth degrees 



o 



