"LEOPARD" AND "LINDEN TREE." y 



As General E. F. Beale received the stallions and kept them at his 

 place, "Ash Hill," near Washington, for three years, he was a compe- 

 tent critic of Kittredge's work. In a similar manner wrote Paymaster- 

 General J. Adams Smith, of the United States Navy. General Smith 

 being an expert horseman, and long having Grant's Arabs in charge, 

 his opinion is of equal value. Then again, Major J. K. Levitt, for fifty 

 years known in Philadelphia as an expert horseman and judge of horses, 

 pronounced the two sketches by H. S. Kittredge as the most perfect 

 likenesses of the two stations which he had at any time seen of any 

 horses. Mr. Levitt was the man who first received the stallions to 

 exhibit, which he did for three months after their arrival. 



I am particular in quoting these criticisms upon my sketches as ex- 

 hibited in this book, because I have seen numerous prints and photo- 

 graphs purporting to represent General Grant's Arabian stallions, no 

 one of which has been the least like them. My sketches are the horses 

 to life, upon paper: and the proofs sent me by Messrs. J. B. Lippincott 

 Company, of Philadelphia, were such excellent reproductions that I 

 intrusted the publication of my work to them. 



HOW I CAME TO ISSUE THIS BOOK. 



Early in May, 1885, I received a letter from a gentleman, intro- 

 ducing himself as a personal friend of General Grant and his family, 

 and, as such, requesting that I give him a transcript of my papers per- 

 taining to the general's Arabian stallions ; as to their shipment from 

 Constantinople, date of shipment, name of vessel, commander, port of 

 entry and date of arrival, also consignment ; referring me to General 

 Grant or either of his sons as to himself. By the next mail another 

 letter came from the same gentleman, asking permission to publish ex- 

 tracts from my private letters to General Grant and his son Ulysses 

 regarding the two stallions, and my stallions by them ; also asking pic- 

 tures of my young horses by Leopard and Linden. 



While the refinement and courtesy of this gentleman's letter was 

 such as to assure me of his good intent, I felt obliged to decline his 

 request. As pirating of my expensive sketches, with plagiarism of my 

 public writings, had been the order of the day for the past three years, 

 I had grown recluse. 



Upon reflection, and knowing the condition of General Grant, I felt 

 that it might be some pleasure to him to see in print the information I 

 had obtained ; also the result of my experiments in breeding to his two 

 stallions ; hence I wrote two articles, which appeared during the months 



