ST. LAWRENCE. 149 



Tliis was doubtless the best Canadian ever brought to the States. He was a 

 trotter and left some trotters ; but nearly or perhaps quite all of these that 

 afterward disting-uished themselves on the trotting course had some infusion 

 of Messenger blood through their dams. The blood of the original horse of 

 this name was unknown, but whatever it was it pushed him along and kept 

 him going at a pace and for a distance that his conformation did not seem to 

 warrant. Some of the trotters of the present day possess a moiety of his blood, 

 but he failed to establish a family that might be designated as trotters. 



I may say that no horse coming' to this country as recently as 1848 

 "wotilcl be likely to produce many trotters that did not in some way or 

 other have lines of the blood of Messenger in the pedigree of their 

 dams; nor would any horse, however great his merit, be likely in our 

 day to establish a separate family, w^holly independent of other lines 

 of trotting: blood. 



The horse that comes before the public at this time having a con- 

 formation in any way more suited to the trotting gait, and adapted in 

 any degree as an outcross to improve the Messenger family and add 

 to their celebrity, certainly possesses great value. This was done by 

 both Bellfounder and Duroc, and the St. Lawrence conformation and 

 v/ay of going is one better calculated to improve the Hambletonian and 

 Duroc-Messenger gaits, than any with which I am ac({uainted. Be- 

 sides, the great ability of that horse as a trotter showed that it was no 

 inferior element to be introduced into the best of trotting families. 

 H. W. Herbert regarded him as a Canadian, and gives his picture in 

 his work, as a sample of the Canadian horse in his highest state of per- 

 fection. It is not improbable that he had some elements of the orig- 

 inal Andalusian blood, from which the pure Canadian horse sprang. 

 This was the origin of that stock, and many representatives of the 

 blood have shown strong traces of the original Barb elements, from 

 which the Andalusian families descended. The rigors of a severe 

 climate and hard usage have left their impress on the stock, but they 

 yet retain many elements that point to their original superiority, which 

 has not entirely been effaced. Mr. Herbert in this connection makes 

 an observation worth repeating. Of the Canadian, he says: 



He is said, although small himself in stature, to have the unusual quality of 

 breeding up in size, with larger and loftier mares than himself, and to give 

 the foals his own vigor, pluck and iron constitution, with the frame and gen- 

 eral aspect of their dams. This, by the way, appears to be a characteristic of 

 the Barb blood above all others, and is a strong corroboration of the legend 

 which attributes to him an early Andalusian strain. 



St. Lawrence made his first record at Montreal, in 1848, in- 2: 34^, 



