44i DESCENDANTS OF MAMBKINO CHIEF. 



Lady Thorn served two purposes, neither of which seem to have 

 come in proper time. She showed the true greatness of Mambrino 

 Chief, and she also gave proof of the quality and character of mares 

 which should have been sent to him. 



Her physical conformation has been often referred to and deserves 

 special consideration. She had a long forearm and a short front can- 

 non, 22 inches for the former and 11^ inches for the latter, and she 

 trotted with a straight, unbending front leg. This has been adverted 

 to by nearly every one who has written concerning her gait. Further- 

 more, her rear leverage and the gait which accompanied it should 

 teach VIS an important lesson. Her propelling power seemed to be 

 immense, and yet it worked with less apparent effort or display than 

 is generally seen in trotters that have large machinery. She did not 

 spread her feet wide apart behind, was no sort of a sprawler — but 

 trailed her hocks low, reaching far out behind and advancing her feet 

 forward further than any trotter ever seen on our turf. While she 

 was a mare of great strength and disjolayed power in every stride, her 

 trotting showed more the result of great and easy working machinery 

 than of powerful muscular organism. In some families, as the sons 

 of Edward Everett, the trotting excellence is shown to be the product 

 of marvelous muscular power; in the case of Lady Thorn, it was due 

 to her perfection of machinery. Her hind feet moved along in true 

 hues, apparently under or alongside of her body, but the way in 

 which she reached them forward and raked the earth from under her 

 was a sight for all the beholders. Her rear conformation was entirely 

 exceptional, and was not such as her blood composition or her family 

 form would have indicated. She differed entirely from her full broth- 

 er, Mambrino Patchen, He measures 39^ inches from the centre of 

 his hip to the outer edge of his hock, and 24^ inches in the length of 

 his thigh, precisely what we might expect for a son of Mambrino Chief 

 from a second Eclipse and Sir Archy mare. But Lady Thorn had a 

 thigh only 23 inches in length, and from the centre of her hip to the 

 outer edare of her hock she was 42 inches. This was the measure- 

 ment of Dr. Herr. When I saw her in February, 1876, she measured 

 43 inches from the centre of the hip to the edge of the hock, but 

 Mr. Conover and myself agreed that an allowance of at least one 

 inch must be made for the forward projection of the sound hip, that 

 one evidently to the eye being thrown forward by the other being 

 •down. Her high breeding and her immense machinery for trotting 

 leverage made her the great trotter that she was, and there can be no 



