48 ROAD, TRACK, AND STABLE. 



as mouse-color), "Bull " ou account of his thick neck, 

 — and the name Blue Bull, thus given in scorn, be- 

 came in the third generation a badge of honor. Mer- 

 ring's Blue Bull had a son called Pruden's Blue Bull, 

 no less remarkable in appearance than his sire. He 

 was a big horse, at least 16^ hands high, weighing 

 twelve hundred pounds, — a mouse-colored beast with 

 a white face, a black stripe down his back, three white 

 feet, and legs marked like those of a zebra. 



A writer in the American Horse Breeder gives the 

 following description of him : " He was a deep mouse- 

 color, generally called blue, blazed face, glass eyes, 

 heavy black mane and tail, black stripe down his back, 

 legs white to the knees, and from there up had yel- 

 low stripes around them. He Avas a powerfully built, 

 heavy-bodied, close-ribbed horse, with an enormous 

 beefy neck, a natural pacer, and ungainly in action. 

 Many of this family were natural pacers, and but few 

 proved to be good riding horses, on account of their 

 awkward and stumbling gait. They were, however, a 

 strong, tough, hardy race of horses, and served admi- 

 rably for heavy teaming in this hilly country before 

 the days of turnpikes and railroads." 



Merring's Blue Bull and his son Pruden's Blue Bull 

 were, then, clumsy pacing cart horses, and Wilson's 

 Blue Bull, son of Pruden's Blue Bull, looked much 

 like his sire and grandsire ; and yet he is the founder 

 of a trotting family almost if not quite as numerous 

 as the Wilkeses or the Electioneers. Wilson's Blue 

 Bull, the only Blue Bull up to his day who had at- 

 tained the slightest distinction, was foaled in 1844. 

 " His appearance," as related by an experienced horse- 

 man, "was the most peculiar I ever saw. Prom a 



