THE AMERICAN HORSE II5 



nation ? Alas ! it is only too well proved that the 

 American trotting horse, bred experimentally in so 

 many cases, does not reproduce two per cent, of 

 trotting speed.' 



But, Count, think of the magnificent trotters who beat 

 the world ! Sunol and Arion, and Axtell and Allerton ! 



' Yes, they have earned a wide-world fame, proving the 

 exception to the rule. But have they not come by 

 accident, as it were, and without any surety beforehand 

 of their being anything phenomenal ! Within the last 

 few years only have the breeders here, with the exception 

 of a very few scientific men, begun to realise their own 

 ignorance and foohsh mistakes in getting away from the 

 blood cause. There is a little secret about breeding to 

 make the produce sure which it takes the uninitiated a 

 long time to find out, and Avhich many American breeders 

 have not yet discovered.' 



Then those who, tired of experiments, have begun 

 to follow out certain inevitable laws in mating, are those 

 who have met with success? 



' Yes, and proud of it they may well be ! They alone 

 have saved the vanishing reputation of the American 

 trotter.' 



Do we not export our trotting horses? 



' Once in a while a phenomenal trotter with a wide re- 

 putation is sent over to the other side ; but they are not 

 exported as a type, or to take the first place in a stud 

 of thoroughbreds, although they are universally admired.' 



But not many years ago the Czar of Russia asked the 

 late Governor Stanford for an exchange of trotting mares 

 with his Russian Orloffs. ^Vould not both countries be 

 mutually benefited by such an exchange? 



