Mambrino Chief and bis Descendants 115 



high, dark bay, coarse-headed, coarse-eared, plain- 

 bodied, coarse-legged, and coarse-hoofed. No 

 fine colt was ever sired by Mambrino Chief. He 

 produced speed but not finish." James B. Clay, 

 a son of the former owner of Mambrino Chief, 

 took issue with General Castleman : " I remember 

 this horse well ; saw him almost every day while 

 he was at Ashland ; he was a dark brown, nearly 

 black; indeed, some would call him black. He 

 was 1 6 hands high, no white about him; some tan 

 on the nose and in the flank ; that is why he was 

 called a brown instead of a black horse. He had 

 a very bony head, but not what would be called 

 an ugly head. His neck was long and beau- 

 tiful, his shoulders very sloping and beautiful; 

 large flat legs, good hocks that were not straight, 

 neither could they be called sickle. His feet 

 were large and flat and not good. He was a 

 large horse, but I never thought him a coarse 

 one." As Mr. Clay's recollection of the horse 

 agrees with the description furnished me by Mr. 

 Thorne in 1884, I cannot do otherwise than con- 

 clude that General Castleman's memory is faulty. 

 When mated with mares of finish and carrying 

 thoroughbred blood, the so-called coarseness of 

 Mambrino Chief was not transmitted. The an- 



