482 COLONIAL HORSES. 



sarily be a failure in either case. People are inclined to be 

 led away by the belief that they are following in the foot- 

 steps of the breeders of hacks and weight-carriers in the 



old country, but they are doing no such thing 



There was a type of horses extant which men called Aus- 

 tralian stock horses. Nothing now remains but a decayed 

 remnant of this grand old breed. They were a distinct 

 type, and when one mentioned the name Australian stock 

 horse it was at once known what was meant, by all who 

 lived in the country, at any rate. He was a big-bodied 

 powerful horse on active legs, and the squatter took a 

 pride and a pleasure in his production. For, as the Vic- 

 torian remount officer now very truly says, this class of 

 horse could be picked up in thirties and forties on numerous 

 stations in the old days. On many runs, 75 per cent, of 

 the horses would have been suitably adapted for the 

 purposes required ; but to-day three or four head is the 

 limit of the powers of production in this direction of some 

 of the very same runs." — (The Australian Pastor alists' 

 Review, i6th July, igoo.) 



" Crespin," writing in the same paper (15th Feb. 

 1900), confirms some of the foregoing remarks by saying : 

 " What is probably the principal cause of so great a dete- 

 rioration in the bulk of Australian horses is the fact of 

 their being bred too weedy, and then an attempt being 

 made to rectify the mistake by using mongrels of staUions 

 called Clevelands and roadsters." Before condemning 

 " Crespin's " use of the word " mongrel," we must bear 

 in mind that the Cleveland and the Hackney are products 

 of numerous crosses. 



From the foregoing remarks we may conclude that the 

 chief defects of Austrahan horses of the present day are 

 want of substance, absence of a distinct type of saddle 

 horse, and want of ability to endure hardship, as we have 

 seen on pages 431 and 432. The product of the light- 

 weight sprinter cross is more or less of the greyhound type, 

 as we can see in Figs. 326 and 494. The type of Colonial 



