Ciiii.nRs Grey Arab /an. 13 



horse it had been in India, said to be of the purest Nejed breed. Both these horses showed the 

 fine quahty and Arab character, especially in their heads and set of their tails : yet were up to 

 great weight — in a word, they were what would be called thorough-bred weight-carrying hacks. 

 The bay was exceedingly docile, and a capital hack ; but Mrs. Turnbull's grey would allow no one 

 but herself to mount him. 



In 1872 Mr. J. M. Clayworth, of Birmingham, exhibited a grey Arab, " Magdala," 14 hands 

 3 inches ; a good hack, and little hunter in the Warwickshire county, which he had himself 

 imported from Egypt. With the highest quality, Magdala had the back and loins of a weight- 

 carrier, capital hack action, and was very much admired by two such judges of pony hacks as 

 Lord Calthorpe and Mr. F. Winn Knight, M.P. A hundred guineas was offered for Magdala 

 by me, and refused. 



These were as unlike the ordinary run of weak actionless pretty-headed Arab ponies, 

 imported at vast expense from the East, as the most celebrated thorough-bred steeplechase 

 horses are unlike the daisy-cutting weeds that are kept to win or lose handicap races of five 

 furlongs. 



In considering the merits of the best Arabs — common ones are the most worthless brutes 

 alive — it must always be remembered that every one in England who breeds for profit wishes 

 to produce either a cart-horse, a race-horse, a hunter, or a carriage-horse ; and that he desires 

 them all to be over rather than under 15 hands 2 inches high. For the purposes of breeding 

 race-horses, hunters, and carriage-horses, we have within this kingdom all the quality and 

 endurance we require if proper use is made of our best materials. 



CHILDE'S grey ARABIAN. 



The following account of tlie one Arabian celebrated in the traditions of Leicestershire 

 hunting was furnished by Mr. Frederick Winn Knight, M.P., grandson of the gentleman who 

 sold the horse to Mr. Childe, who is celebrated as the originator of the modern system of riding 

 straight to hounds — a system which has completely altered the character of the English 

 hunter. The old system was to take timber with a standing jump, and all leaps with a care 

 and deliberation quite unknown to those who now aspire to be in the first flight with foxhounds 

 in flying countries. 



" All sporting authors agree that Mr. Childe, of Kinlet Hall, in Shropshire, was the father 

 of the present system of straight riding to hounds. He was familiarly known as ' Straight 

 Childe ' and the ' Flying Childe.' He was one of Mr. Meynell's earliest followers to Melton, 

 and for many years was the undoubted leader of the Melton fields. He only left 

 Leicestershire, and retired to the mastership of a pack of foxhounds in Shropshire, 

 when later in life he found himself unable to keep his old place in front of Villiers, 

 Cholmondeley, Forester, Germaine, and others, his pupils in the art of riding to hounds. But 

 it is not so generally known that Mr. Childe's best horse, in the palmiest days of the Quorn 

 under Old Meynell, was a thorough-bred Arab ; although the ' Druid,' usually well-informed 

 in such matters, has described him as a half-bred Arab. The story runs thus : — 



" Lord Pigott, of Patsull, in Shropshire, who died (in prison) governor of Madras, passed most 

 of his life in India. He sent home from time to time a selection of the best Arab horses and 

 mares he could procure in the East, and with them established a small breeding-stud at Patsull. 

 At the time of his violent death in India there were a number of young Arabs of various 

 ages running unbroken in Patsull Park. 



" The whole stud was sold by Lord Pigott's executors, and the horse in question was 



