BLOOD OF MAMJBEIKO. 309 



saw it. So we will have to be contented to rest on her 

 qualities as a roadster. The breeding of his sire is unques- 

 tionable, though I have heard many claim that he was 

 only half-bred. I quote from the Turf Register of 1840, 

 "Pedigree of Mambrino:" 



"The following certificate given by his breeder, Col Lewis 

 Morris, leaves no doubt of the purity of his blood : 



' I certify that the bay colt bred by me, three years old 

 the 16th of last month, was got by old Messenger, his dam 

 by Sourkrout, grandam by Whirligig, great-grandam Miss 

 Slamerkin, by Wildair, out of the imported Cub mare. 



' Given under my hand at Morrisania. 



' June 19th, 1810. LEWIS MOKEIS.'" 



Mambrino, then, was thoroughbred, and to those who 

 would argue that Abdallah was indebted to the road mare 

 for his trotting qualities, I would say that Mambrino 

 proved his capacity to entail this qualification through 

 other branches of the family, as the many descendants 

 gracing the track at this day abundantly prove. 



From this desultory talk you may imagine that the web 

 I am trying to weave is much " tattered and torn " before 

 it leaves the loom. But the trouble is that, amidst the 

 abundance of material for warp and woof, the time is 

 limited to construct even a short piece, and I am throwing 

 the shuttle almost at random, leaving threads of different 

 color in an incongruous mass that would form a very 

 handsome pattern if care and time were taken to get each 

 one in the right mesh of the hiddles. 



The deductions drawn from the consideration of the 

 pedigrees and performances of these animals and their 

 descendants would naturally be, that in the Messenger 

 strain there is a manifest tendency to a fast trotting gait, 

 that it is so powerful in this particular that it overbalances 

 contaminating streams, and that those animals having the 

 most racing blood mixed with the Messenger have been 



14 



