CHAPTER VII 



HALF-BREDS, COBS, AND PONIES 



THE HALF-BRED HUNTER — THE IRISH HUNTER — THE CHARGER — THE COVERT-, EOAD-, AND 

 PARK-HACK— THE LADIEs' HORSE — COBS, GALLOWAYS, AND PONIES — THE CARRIAGE, 

 BROUGHAM, OR CAB-HORSE— THE HEAVY MACHINER— THE PHAETON-HORSE, GIGSTER, 

 OR FAST TROTTER. 



All the varieties included in this chapter require a considerable infusion 

 of Eastern blood, inasmuch as though some of the harness-horses are not 

 called on to travel very fast, yet considering the weights they have to 

 draw, their efforts are violent enough to tax both the wind and stamina 

 to an extent which can only be endured by the Eastern horse or his 

 descendants. Even the omnibus-horse, travelling only six or seven miles 

 within the hour, including stoppages, must not be of cart blood, or he 

 will knock up before he reaches the end of his first journey, when called 

 upon to draw his share of four tons at that pace. The Exmoor ponies 

 have a strong infusion of Eastern blood in them, and the light and 

 elegant head of the Shetlander in itself would almost warrant us in 

 including him in the list. It is well known that the New Forest ponies 

 in the last century were repeatedly supplied with an Eastern cross, 

 and tlie celebrated Marske, sire of Eclipse, is said to have covered 

 several of the mares of this breed, while standing at Bistern, near 

 Ringwood, in Hampshire, in 1767-1768, for want of mares of a superior 

 character. This chapter, therefore, will include a description of every 

 English horse but the thoroughbred and the heavy draught-horses used 

 for agricultural purposes, and the moving of heavy goods. The term 

 " half-bred " is a misnomer, for it is generally applied to those horses 

 which have a much larger proportion of Eastern blood than half, and, 

 in many cases, they possess fully thirty-one parts out of thirty-two, or 

 even more. Mr. Apperley (Nimrod) advocated the first cross between 

 the cart-mare and the thoroughbred horse for hunting purposes, but 

 the plan has not been found to answer, and it is now entirely abandoned 

 from a long experience of the want of symmetry in the produce, and 

 from their deficiency in staying powers over a distance of ground. Even 

 for fast road- work their legs do not stand, but throw out splints, side 

 bones, or spavins, so soon and so frequently, that they are never chosen 

 for the purpose by good judges on that account alone. 



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