ii6 



OUR DOMESTIC ANIMALS 



bred in a land new to them, cling with wonderful 

 tenacity to original forms and characteristics. 

 These imported horses are easily adaptable to 

 our soil and climate, and to-day one can scarcely 



Frisian Stallion 



Four years old 



find a county in any state that does not pos- 

 sess pure-blooded animals representing some 

 of these breeds. 



The American trotter, the most remarkable 

 of all horses, is a descendant of the English 

 Thoroughbred, and has been improved and 

 developed for a special purpose — 

 speed. One hundred years ago there 

 was no authenticated record of any 

 horses going faster than a mile in 

 less time than two and three-quarters 

 minutes ; to-day we have records for 

 one mile in two minutes, or even 

 better, for Dan Patch, the pacing 

 wonder, during the past summer 

 covered the mile in 1.55-^. 



III. Breeding of Horses 

 The breeding of horses has gone 

 through many modifications in the 

 course of time, dating back to long- 

 past ages. We still find traces of 

 half-savage forms in the east of Russia and 

 its adjoining regions. 



According to the direction given to breeding, 

 some races have been condemned to disappear 

 and give place to others that answered better 



to the requirements of owners. Thanks to 

 repeated crossings in a certain direction, old 

 characteristic qualities disappear and are re- 

 placed by other forms and qualities. 



By continually selecting the 

 heaviest animals of a heavy race, 

 and giving them such food as their 

 needs require, our heavy breeds of 

 draft horses have been obtained, — 

 horses that rear themselves like 

 giants of fairy tales to the eyes of 

 those who see them for the first time. 

 In using for propagation the fleet- 

 est animal of a fleet and noble race, 

 and giving to their product an edu- 

 ration that develops the muscles and 

 lendons, and by carefully repressing 

 all obesity, breeders are obtaining 

 more and more animals of incredible 

 speed, which, especially on the 

 American race track, are taking less 

 and less time to cover a certain distance. 



By always using the smallest specimens of a 

 race of small ponies breeders have succeeded 

 in producing horses no larger than mastiffs. 

 A dwarf horse, two years old, exhibited in 

 New York in 1901, was onl\' twenty-three 



Frisian Stallion, Jet Black 



inches in height. Breeders also seize and repro- 

 duce the freaks of nature, such as the albino 

 horses (born white) of Denmark and Hanover. 

 Among the most ancient stud farms we must 

 rank those established by the Norman kings in 



