194 A TREATISE ON HORSE-BREEDING. 



by the Racing Calendar, it being taken for 

 granted that no horse could be a creditable 

 performer that was not well bred an assump- 

 tion that has never yet been found at fault. 

 The first volume compiled upon this basis fur- 

 nished the foundation for all subsequent ones; 

 and few names have been admitted to registry 

 that do not trace, without admixture, on both 

 sides, to an ancestry that is recorded in the first 

 volume or to subsequent importations of Ori- 

 ental blood. 



Prof. Low, in his great work upon the "Do- 

 mesticated Animals of Great Britain," in com- 

 menting upon the various importations of for- 

 eign blood that went to make up the foundation 

 of the English blood horse, says: 



The lighter horses for speed, introduced previous to the 

 reign of James I, were Spaniards, Barbs and Turks. But 

 King James, on his accession to the English crown, resolved 

 to try the Arabian, with which his reading had probably 

 rendered him familiar. He purchased a horse of that race, 

 imported from the east by an English merchant, Mr. Mark- 

 ham, for which he paid the sum, great in those days, of 500. 

 This horse, however, in no way distinguished on the turf or 

 for his stock, attracted little attention. The Duke of New- 

 castle, who afterward wrote a remarkable work on horses, 

 took an especial dislike to this Arabian, abused him as a 

 bony creature, good for nothing, because being trained to 

 the course he could not run. This opinion seems to have 

 exercised a great influence on the breeders for the turf, and 

 it was not until after the lapse of more than a hundred years 

 that the neglected Arabian was again resorted to. During 

 this long period Barbs and Turks from the Levant were the 



