THE THOROUGH-BRED HORSE. * 299 



the highest degree of perfection by the influences of a pre- 

 eminently favorable climate, the most careful breeding, and 

 by every attention the art of horsemanship can devise. His 

 form has been so much changed as scarcely to be recognized, 

 and his fleetness has certainly been greatly increased. It is 

 not merely for his performances on the turf that the thorough- 

 bred horse is interesting to us. It is to him we look for the 

 improvement of our horses for nearly every purpose. A de- 

 scription of him may not, therefore, be uninteresting. 



Of all breeds, perhaps, the racer, or thorough-bred horse, is 

 the most useless for the general purposes of the farmer. !N'ot 

 one out of fifty would be worth raising for such service. He 

 is not fit for the cart, the plow, nor the carriage. For the two 

 former purposes he is neither able nor willing. For the latter 

 he is willing, but not able. If the race-horse is put to the cart 

 or plow with a heavy horse, he is too fast for the heavy one, 

 and soon becomes heated. And the more the racer is heated, 

 the more passionate he becomes ; and if he can- not get to go 

 ahead, he will become sullen and will not pull at all, and he 

 can never again be made to pull. He ^vill, with very few ex- 

 ceptions, suffer death first. Light, quick, single draught is all 

 that he is at all fit for. As to hunting, he is entirely useless. 

 He can not jump high. Ev^en if he could leap, he is too light to 

 carry the weight of a man in the descent over a wall or fence 

 five or five and a half feet high. 



The thorough-bred race-horse is long in the body, has fine 

 ears, prominent eyes, and is remarkably wide between the jaws, 

 wide nostrils, and small, thin lips. His neck is long and fine, 

 his mane very thin, and lies close to the neck. When standing, 

 his neck, on the top, is almost straight, his withers remarkably 

 high and thin, his back low at the withers and straight to the 

 haunches ; he is high and close coupled, and very long, meas- 

 uring from the haunch to the turn of the rump, and long and 

 thin from there to the tip of the hough. He stands with his legs 

 rather under the body than erect; this gives him great power 



