PRINCIPLES OF BREEDING. 73 



even now, in the majority of cases, is a pursuit, notori- 

 ously tainted with this fatal element of uncertainty. 

 The history of almost every breeder is a history of ex- 

 travagant hopes and bitter disappointments. His whole 

 career has been one of struggle, delusive successes, and 

 total failures. If now and then he has made a "hit" 

 as the saying is, if occasionally he has produced a fast 

 colt, the very success served only, in the way of con- 

 trast, to make his failures all the more noticeable. The 

 great trotting-horses of the country have not been 

 foaled, in the proportion that one might reasonably ex- 

 pect, in the great stables of the country : they have 

 come, rather, before the public from obscure sources. 

 In many cases, as with Dutchman and Flora Temple 

 and Ripton, no one can tell up to this day any thing of 

 the sire or the dam. The fact that three such horses, 

 and scores of others of almost equal merit, have no 

 known parentage, reveals how rude and unsuccessful 

 the breeding efforts of the country have been. Who 

 can conceive of three winners of the Derby with no 

 known pedigree ? Who can imagine a horse arising 

 in England, who should win all the principal prizes, 

 and remain king of the English turf for six or ten 

 years, and no Enghshman be able to tell the stable 

 in which he was born, the dam that foaled him, or 

 the horse which was his sire ? Such a thing would be 

 impossible : for there the principles of breeding are 

 understood ; the result that shall come from the union 

 of two strains of blood can be predicted ; and successes 



