TEACHING YEARLINGS. 197 



makes them mipleasant horses to train ; nor, 

 generally speaking, are they of much profit to 

 the owners. 



The fourth class I shall suppose to consist of 

 three fillies, which makes up the number, twelve 

 yearlings, I proposed to train. Now, with regard 

 to their physical or constitutional powers, they 

 do not vary from the colts, but, like them, are 

 craving, hearty, and flighty ; and upon their struc- 

 ture, the same as with the colts, will depend their 

 different racing properties ; and their tempers 

 also are similar. But, as they advance on to 

 mares, they become in training more trouble- 

 some and uncertain than horses ; this proceeds 

 from their natural propensity to sexual intercourse, 

 which is greater in racing fillies and mares than 

 with other fillies and mares in common use. 

 The former require to be highly fed and warmly 

 clothed ; and from their standing in stables of a 

 warm temperature with entire horses, (which was 

 almost invariably the case when I was a boy), 

 their natural propensity more often predomi- 

 nates, and which, as I have before noticed, is 

 the cause of so strong and frequent a desire in 

 them for sexual intercourse ; and this, not only 

 as the spring advances, but at various other 



