S04 FLORIDA. 



Bellfounder. The dams of Bodiue, St. Julien, Gazelle, Prospero, 

 Reform, and others that have been previously named, run back to 

 Bellfounder, and in their success testimony is found to prove the out- 

 lasting merit of this blood. 



It is one of the noteworthy facts in breeding that in regard to 

 several of the important sources from whence we have derived our 

 trotting blood the original fountain did not seem to give us as rich and 

 •beautiful currents as those that have sprung from later or more diluted 

 branches. 



The native germ of excellence lay in the parent stock, but the most 

 excellent manifestations of the blood are seen after it has been filtered 

 through other forms and in part toned down or modified by other ele- 

 ments. It was so with the blood of Messenger. In itself, while it had 

 two tendencies, the trotting iijclinations had to be freed in a measure 

 from their native combination with the Arab elements that were 

 blended with them. His success as a trotting sire is seen best in his 

 more remote descendants, since the alliance of his blood with the 

 other trotting elements have eliminated its real trotting excellence and 

 presented the same ready for acceptable use in any combination. 



Likewise such was the case with Pilot the pacer. His blood was 

 •foreign and had to be naturalized by a commingling with that of the 

 thoroughbred, after which it became an acceptable cross for any and 

 all bloods which had original consanguinity with or toward the warm 

 blooded families. Our experience wdth the blood of Bellfounder shows 

 clearly that in its original form as presented fresh from the Norfolk 

 trotter it possessed one element, a real drug that did not fuse readily 

 in any combination. He was not, in his O'wn immediate efforts in the 

 introduction of his blood on this Continent, an absolute success. 

 Tested by his first fruits, and the essential transmitting qualities his 

 own descendants seemed to possess, he was a failure. 



True, the Charles Kent mare was a trotter, and her power to trans- 

 mit these qualities of the Bellfounder blood were enough to save him. 

 The same may be said of the other daughter that produced Harry 

 Clay. Something may also be said of like import of one or two 

 others, but these were all out of twenty years service and a current 

 popularity that surpassed any cotemporary stallion. Abdallah was 

 unpopular — almost discarded — yet he left his powerful impress every- 

 where. Nevertheless of Bellfounder it may be said his success lies in 

 the fact that he plantofl the germ, and in the later crosses of that blood 

 its real force and value is coming out. I have no doubt that some of 



