SELECTIONS IN BREEDING. 25 



should, in justice, be attributed to improvement in our vehicles and tracks, 

 and to increased skill in the trainer, yet it is undeniable, that by far the 

 greater portion of it has resulted fi-om increased capacity in our horses, 

 bred for two, three or four generations especially with reference to tliis qual- 

 ity ; and it is worthy of especial remark, that, of the 203 horses with a record of 

 2 : 25 or better, whose breeding can be traced even as far as the sire, over 90 

 per cent, of them are more or less closely related to one or more of our recog- 

 nized trotting families. 



Hence, while chance trotters may occasionally be produced, as of yore, 

 through spontaneous variations, our breeders and trainers have found that by 

 confining themselves to the descendants of three or four well-known trotting 

 families, the probabilities of producing fast trotters are infinitely gi'eater than 

 by going outside, for within these families the trotting gait has been culti- 

 vated by selection and use, until heredity has begun to lend its powerful aid 

 in transmitting what Avas originally a spontaneous or accidental superiority ; 

 and the breeder who introduces a single cross in which the trotting gait has 

 not become an inherent quality, only adds to the probabilities of failure, and 

 postpones the day when we shall be able to breed fast trotters Avith certainty. 

 There is, as yet, no necessity for an outcross to promote strength, endurance, 

 and vigor, for some of our trotting families are, in this respect, the peers of 

 any breed of horses in the world ; and there is still sufficient room for selec- 

 tion within these families to correct all the bad effects of close in-breeding. 



It may possibly be necessary to resort to some crosses outside of these trot- 

 ting families for improvement in some other quality; but there is no outcross 

 that we can possibly make without danger to the transmission and improve- 

 ment of the trotting gait. Even those of our trotters that belong to none of 

 the recognized trotting families are almost invariably the result of selection 

 with a view to this faculty. In almost every case of "breeding unknown" 

 we have found that the dam was " a fast trotter." In short, the more thor- 

 oughly w^e investigate the course of breeding that has produced our trotting 

 horses, the more completely does it confirm the theory of breeding from 

 animals that possess the quality we wish to perpetuate. 



In the breeding of animals, the one object aimed at is to produce 

 superiority or excellence in the animal for the purpose for which he is 

 produced or kept. The value of a trotting stallion is dependent on 

 his ability to reprodiice, in the highest degree, the qualities of speed 

 and endurance, with plenty of game, courage, style and tractability, 

 in his offspring. It makes no difference how excellent, or how indif- 

 ferent, he may be in all these qualities in himself, his value as a 

 stallion depends on his ability to transmit these cjualities. He may 

 never have shown any excellence as a trotter himself, of which the 

 world at large has any reliable information — as in the case of two 

 notable members of the two prominent trotting families — yet his value 

 becomes established when it is known that he is a producer of trotters 

 of superiority. 



