142 ^V AMERICAN FARMER IX EXGLAND. 



us dancing and capering, catching our knapsacks with their teeth, 

 then springing off and coming back again, like dogs at play. The 

 mares, fillies, and colts were all of dark bay color but one, which 

 was dark iron-grey, nearly black. 



Just as we left the colts, a great cart-horse, belonging to the 

 Marquis, was passing on the road. The contrast was striking. 

 He was seventeen hands and one inch high (within a trifle, six 

 feet), and putting both my thumbs to the smallest part of his leg, 

 I could not make my fingers meet around it. 



From the paddocks we went to the stables to see the stallions. 

 They were all loose boxes (no stalls), thirteen feet by sixteen, 

 some with rack and manger across the side, some with the same 

 in a corner. Touchstone is a magnificent creature. It is impos- 

 sible to imagine higher condition, indicated not less in the happy 

 and spirited expression and action, than in the bright, smooth, 

 supple, and elastic feel of his skin. I never saw any tiling to 

 equal it ; and it was nearly as remarkable in the mares. Five 

 thousand guineas (over $25,000) have been offered and refused 

 for Touchstone. Springy-Jack is a younger stallion ; by Nutting 

 esteemed even higher than Touchstone. Nothing in the world 

 of animal life can be finer than the muscular development of his 

 neck. Touchstone is thought a little coarse in the withers. They 

 were intending to put him in pasture the next week, and in pre- 

 paration for it, he had some fresh grass mixed with hay to eat. 

 He stood in a deep bed of straw, and was not curried groomed 

 merely with a cloth yet he was so clean that it would not have 

 soiled a white linen handkerchief to have rubbed it upon him. 



In the granary we saw some very plump and bright Scotch 

 oats ; they were bought for 42 Ibs. to the bushel, but would over- 

 weigh that. The common feed was oat and bean meal, mixed 

 with cut hay. The hay was cut very fine (not more than |- inch 

 lengths) by a hand machine. I believe, cut as it usually is by 



