SADDLE HORSES. 17-j 



over the ground at a rate which few larger horses 

 can equal for a long distance. As a rule, they are 

 not, of course, fast trotters, but I know of one, a 

 half-bred roan pony, with a beautiful blood-like head 

 and sloping rump, that has the big, wide gait of a 

 true trotter. This pony, I have no doubt, could trot a 

 mile in three minutes or better, and he is also a fast 

 runner and a good jumper. Occasionally, one finds 

 among these half-bred ponies one with a longer back, 

 lower-carried head, and longer neck than are common, 

 looking exactly like a diminutive race horse. I have 

 ridden one such, a chestnut mare, extremely nervous, 

 thin-waisted, long and low, a sort of toy thorough- 

 bred, highly intelligent and capable of being tamed 

 and taught like a pet dog. But this pony is nearly 

 clean bred. 



A writer in the recent Badminton volume on "Elid- 

 ing states that in selecting a polo pony the object 

 should be to get one resembling as closely as possible 

 a race horse in petto. It is dangerous to differ in 

 any degree from so high an authority, but I should 

 have thought that the ideal polo pony, though in 

 other respects resembling a thoroughbred race horse, 

 is shorter in the back. Certainly the w^ork is so dif- 

 ferent that some difference in construction might be 

 presumed to exist. The polo pony must be a weight- 

 carrier. It is notable, also, that the portraits of su- 

 perior polo ponies given in the Badminton volume 

 represent, most commonly, short-backed animals ; and, 

 finally, such is the shape of the Arab and of the Barb, 

 — both of which breeds furnish excellent polo ponies. 



The training of saddle horses is a matter w T ith 

 which I shall not attempt to deal, inasmuch as it has 



