156 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



If the cost of trotter-breeding was merely for the fee of the 

 sire, the time of a mare and the keeping, of a colt, it might be 

 repaid, even by the services of a brute fit for a horse-car or 

 cheap livery ; but the cost of breeding is only the vestibule 

 of this temple of expense. Each of these animals has been 

 "handled for speed." One season in the hands of a profes- 

 sional horse-puller, with all the expense of sulkies, blankets, 

 sponges, toe-weights, bo.ots, constant changing of shoeing, 

 etc., will take the cost of a trotter up to a figure that he will 

 never realize in the prosaic form of a mere horse. 



Even when the best mares have been bred to the luckiest 

 cross of stallions, it is conceded by thoughtful horsemen that 

 the chance of record speed is as one to a hundred ; so that in 

 the hap-hazard method, it is a bucket of water to the broad 

 Atlantic. But if the exceptional low-bred horse develops 

 speed that survives training ; if his feet withstand the ignorant 

 shoeing that coutracts the hoof, and his muscles bear the 

 hammering that commonly puffs them, and his joints do not 

 stiffen from sweats and over- working, there is another trouble 

 that confronts us, — the change in the times has so reduced the 

 finances of the average trotter-buyer, that there is no market 

 for the colt when his owner is ready to sell. 



In proof of this, one need only refer to the sales at auction 

 of trotting stock, during the year past, and to the fact that 

 city boarding stables have been full of horses, unfit for heavy 

 work, that have been abandoned for their board bills. 



If a man breeds from curiosity, or to gratify a whim, and 

 can afford the expense, he has a right to do so. To this class 

 we would not venture to offer advice. But to the farmer we 

 may say that horse-breeding is a safe, easy, and legitimate 

 branch of his business. 



Colts are not more liable to accident than horned stock, and 

 they are not so subject to disease. They are raised as cheaply 

 in respect to food, and they clo not require more room. It is 

 easy to handle and teach them. Well-bred colts mature early, 

 and at two years of age should pay their way with the light 

 work of the farm. The French breeders of the Percherons 

 make them earn their living at eighteen months of age. 



The writer has seen three-year-old thoroughbreds ploughing 

 as merrily as they afterwards ran races ; and at Waterloo, the 



