14 A TREATISE ON HORSE-BREEDING. 



an aid to the reproduction of desirable forms 

 and qualities in our domestic animals. It has 

 been said of Bakewell, one of the first great 

 improvers of live stock in Great Britain, that 

 he regarded the animals upon his farm as wax 

 in his hands, out of which in good time he 

 could mould any form that he desired to create. 

 In fact, all our domestic animals have been, to 

 a great degree, moulded and fashioned by the 

 hand of man. The same uniformity that now 

 characterizes the bison, the elk and the deer 

 probably belonged to the horse, the cow, the 

 sheep and the swine, in a state of nature. The 

 ponderous English Cart horse and the diminu- 

 tive Shetland pony, are all believed to have 

 descended from an original as uniform in its 

 characteristics as are the members of a herd of 

 bison upon our western prairies. The Short- 

 horn, the Hereford, the Devon, the Jersey, and 

 all of the various breeds into which our cattle 

 are now divided, are descended, it is believed, 

 from the same original type. 



CAUSES OF VARIATION FROM ORIGINAL TYPES. 



That the changed conditions of life to which 

 animals have been subjected by domestica- 

 tion the variety of uses to which they have 

 been put, the food upon which they have sub- 

 sisted, the climate in which they have been 

 reared, and selection for special uses have 



