394 HANDY-BOOK OP HUSBANDRY. 



spring and an agility in his movements that are uncommon in the 

 region, and on examination, I found that he was obviously doing 

 quite one-half of the work. At the end of a long day he had the 

 same vigor and activity with which he commenced in the morn- 

 ing, and there was an intelligent, quick movement of the ears, 

 and a spring in his step, that one rarely sees in a farm-horse. 

 On inquiry, I found that he was twenty-eight years of age, had 

 been owned by the same man and employed in the same work 

 twenty-four years, had never missed a day, and had never let pass 

 an opportunity to do as much work as lay in his power. ' He was 

 fat and sleek, and I should have judged him, from his general ap- 

 pearance, to be not more than seven or eight years old. It turned 

 out that he was the progeny of a common farm mare, of good form, 

 by a thoroughbred race-horse, that had been brought into the 

 country for a single season, and so few mares were sent to him, 

 that it was not found profitable to keep him here. 



On the Madison Avenue Une of omnibuses in New York City, 

 it has always been the rule to buy horses with the largest possible 

 proportion of thorough-blood. I should say that, at the time 

 when I noticed the teams of this line, the horses of the whole 

 stable would average more than half-bred, many of them probably 

 seven-eighths ; and during the heavy snows of winter, this line 

 always makes better time than any other, and the proportion of 

 loss among their teams is much less, while the average num- 

 ber of years of service of each horse is much greater than on 

 any other line in the city, the others paying no regard to blood, 

 but purchasing any animals that are sound, and, apparently, of 

 strong frame. 



Several years ago I rode almost daily — sometimes from fifty to 

 sixty miles in a day — a thoroughbred English mare, weighing less 

 than eight hundred pounds, and, although rather a heavy-weight 

 myself, I have never found another horse, even of much greater 

 size, that would carry me so far in a day, so many days in suc- 

 cession, and with so little apparent distress, as this mare would. 



In the army, in. the spring and summer of 1864, I rode a horse 

 captured from a rebel officer, and learned that he was probably 



