192 ROAD, TRACK, AND STABLE. 



shire coach horse. An American horseman of national 

 reputation, the importer and owner of some excellent 

 hackneys, writes to me as follows : " The Xorfolk and 

 Yorkshire hackneys are a distinct breed of horses; 

 with some thoroughbred and other crosses, of course, 

 but still a distinct breed. They stamp their charac- 

 teristics on their progeny in a very marked and de- 

 cided manner, — more marked than any other breed 

 of horses that I know of." And he goes on to describe 

 them: "The Norfolk and Yorkshire hackneys are 

 from 14 hands to 15.3, or even 16 hands high. The 

 average is perhaps 15.1J. A good hackney is a horse 

 of considerable substance, with plenty of bone, fine 

 quality, good length, on short legs, and with riding 

 shoulders. He is a fast and good walker, and his 

 trot is bold, straight, and true, and fast enough for 

 him to go ten to fourteen miles an hour. Many 

 Norfolk and Yorkshire hackneys have trotted better 

 than a mile in three minutes. The fine weight-carry- 

 ing hacks one sees in Eotten Row, and the splendid 

 teams that are paraded at the meets of the coaching 

 and four-in-hand clubs in Hyde Park, are nearly all 

 hackne} T s." 



Of late years there have been imported to this 

 country many representatives of all these families, 

 the Cleveland bay, the Yorkshire coach horse, and the 

 hackney, — some of them fine specimens, and some of 

 them hardly worth their passage money. In fact, 

 many of the animals exhibited at our horse shows, and 

 sometimes actually winning prizes, as English car- 

 riage horses and coaching stallions, have been coarse, 

 clumsy brutes, but a slight distance removed from the 

 cart horse, and frequently not even sound. 



