THE HORSE. 



Insertions of British horses. 



it has been satisfactorily ascertained that they 

 are capable of performing what no others can. 

 Among our racers we have had one (Childers) 

 which has been known to pass over eighty-two 

 feet and a half in a second of time; a degree of 

 fleetness perhaps unequalled by any other animal 

 of this species. In the year 174J, the post- 

 master of Stretton rode, on different horses^ 

 along the road to and from London, no less than 

 two hundred and fifteen miles in eleven hours 

 and a half, a rate of above eighteen miles an 

 hour: and in July, 1788, a horse belonging to a 

 gentleman in London, was trotted for a wager 

 thirty miles in an hour and twenty-five minutes; 

 which is at the rate of more than twenty-one 

 miles an hour. In London a single horse has 

 been known to draw the weight of three tons : 

 and some of the pack-horses of the North usually 

 carry burthens of four hundred pounds; but the 

 most remarkable proof of the strength of these 

 animals is in our mill-horses, some of which have 

 been known to carry, at one load, thirteen mea- 

 sures of corn, thatln the whole would exce,ed 

 nine hundred pounds in weight. 



Yet, notwithstanding his prodigious strength, 

 and surprising powers of body, such is the dispo- 

 sition x of the horse, that he very rarely exerts 

 either to his owner's prejudice. Providence 

 seems to have implanted in him a benevolent 

 disposition, and a fear of the human race, with, 

 at the same time, a certain consciousness of the 

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