CHAPTER III 



HISTORY OF HORSE cuLTiVATiox — continued 



The first record of penalties for disregarding the precise 

 rules in racing appears in a race at Chester, in the 

 time of Charles the Second. 



When the sheriffs of Chester presented a piece of 

 plate for the winner, the High Sheriff borrowed a 

 Barbary horse of Sir Thomas Middleton, and won the 

 plate himself. This unworthy and undignified action 

 on the part of the High Sheriff, so disgusted the owners, 

 that it caused 'all the gentry to relinquish these rules 

 ever since.' 



To the enactment of a law preventing the 'pro- 

 miscuous herding of many animals of varying size, 

 merit and breed,' of ' weeding out the undersized entire 

 horses,' and 'kiUing and burying the mares not able 

 to bear foals of reasonable stature,' may be attributed 

 the gradual dying out of the smaller native breeds of 

 horses, and the appearance, in their stead, of a race of 

 useful, stout, speedy and beautiful animals. 



By an act passed in the reign of Henry the Eighth, 

 the nobility were ordered to breed 'great horses,' and 

 in the reign of his successor, Edward the Sixth, it was 

 a ' capital offence to steal a horse,' nor could such an 

 offender have the 'privilege of clergy.' 



With the Restoration came the development of 

 racing, and from the reign of the ' Merry Monarch,' 



147 



