BREEDING OF HUNTERS. 251 



tions, a big deep horse on remarkably short legs. 

 Ex-racers of any note have very seldom earned a 

 name across country, and Mr. D. Robertson's Edgar, 

 by Shakespeare, who carried him for eighteen sea- 

 sons, is one of the few instances to the contrary. 



Shropshire always stood high as a hunting county, 

 when Corbet, Hill, Graham, Puleston, and Mytton 

 were its scarlet kings ; but its enthusiasm has been 

 somewhat on the wane since the Hills gave up the 

 hounds. Still, though the fields are not what they 

 were, the breeders of hunters have lost none of their 

 traditional renown. By the side of the gently- 

 flowing Teme, and that pleasant Herefordshire 

 Arcadia into which it leads, and in and about the 

 mighty Norman fortress of Ludlow, the central point 

 of view from so many broad dales, and bare heathery 

 hills, jostling and crowding one another right into 

 the heart of Wales, some of the rarest hunters of 

 the present century have been reared. They have 

 always been especially prized by the dealers, -and 

 generally run from fifteen two to fifteen three. As 

 a class they are long and low, and quick striders 

 through dirt, and so sweet and clean about the head 

 that ' f he's got the Shropshire head" is one of the 

 most time-honoured phrases of the dealers' vocabu- 

 lary. They invariably improve in this part as they 

 get older, as the serum wastes, and nothing but 

 muscle is left. In his day, Mr. Anderson, senior, 

 used to be very fond of Shropshire hunters as a class, 

 and he would get down before almost any of his 

 brethren to Shrewsbury fair, invite fifteen to twenty 

 farmers to breakfast at The Raven, and bring away 

 fourteen or fifteen of their best nags. The breeders 

 to the Ludlow country owe not a little to the late 

 Mr. Lechmere Charlton, for the carefully-culled sires 

 he introduced. At one time, however, the Shropshire 

 men grew more careless about pedigree, and just 

 selected the cheapest sire that happened, to travel 



