42 "GENERAL BEALE," " HEGIRA," -ISLAM;' 



stands in their way, not stopping to study into the values of the 

 obstacles. 



I have been charged with being over-enthusiastic in the matter of 

 Arabian blood, called by us Clay. Now, I never began to contend for 

 it as did Mr. Weaver of Philadelphia, or Mr. Dorsey of Kentucky, for 

 each of these gentlemen contended for their individual horse. My con- 

 tention has been for the blood, pro bono publico; and even in that par- 

 ticular I was misjudged by friends, who would ask me "if it was glory" 

 I was after. Far from it. 



In the matter of Golddust, the war broke out, and his possibilities 

 for Kentucky and the country at large were cut short. I remember a 

 lot of horses and mares by Golddust, which Mr. Dorsey sent on to 

 Long Island at the beginning of the war. They were in a large barn 

 near John I. Sneidicker's place, near the old Union track. I examined 

 them many times, and will say that to-day, such good horses are rare. 

 After the war, attempts to establish Golddust were frustrated from two 

 causes: first was owing to the multitude of coarse horses, more fash- 

 ionable in the name, and second was the mistaken idea of improving 

 the blood of Golddust through infusion of the blood of the rigid run- 

 ning-horse with its instinct. Had Mr. Dorsey selected inbred Morgan 

 and high-type Clay mares for his horse he would by this time have 

 created a " national coach-, road-, and trotting-horse" without equal in 

 the world. The same could have been accomplished with Messenger, 

 or with Young Bashaw, or Andrew Jackson, or Henry Clay. The 

 opportunities for a "national horse" have presented themselves, but 

 have not been embraced because of want of intelligent application to 

 the object upon the part of gentlemen of means. General William T. 

 Withers, of Kentucky, is now working towards such a base. I know 

 him to be creating a superior maternal foundation, but whether he will 

 introduce the right form of blood in the male, remains to be seen. 



Naturally, he will feel pride in establishing his breed through his 

 Almont; and while Almont did possess largely ot Arabian blood 

 through Andrew Jackson and Pilot, and the maternal foundation will 

 be solid through "Clay" and Keene Richards's Arab mares, his results 

 would be more uniform and every way more satisfactory, were he to 

 make the king of his haras a direct descendant of a high-type Arabian 

 stallion, through a Morgan, Jackson, or a Clay mare ; but small mistakes 

 by the individual have disappointed more than one Napoleonic attempt. 

 The General remembers that by the male are the names given ; and 

 that rich mother-earth grows poor seed into prominence. Such seed, 



