BREEDING OF HORSES. 305 



durins: the winter has been on this threshiuor-machine work- 

 ing alone. 



QuESTiox. Will you please tell how that colt is fed? 



Maj. Alvoed. We did not wean it early, and it got 

 nothing but mother's milk until it was three months old. It 

 is now eating oats and hay ; it has had a little bran mixed 

 with the hay, but chiefly oats and hay. 



Question. What is the color of the stallion you im- 

 ported ? 



Maj. Alvord. Gray. All five of our animals are gray, 

 and the filly is gray. I saw in New York, two hundred 

 and sixty-two stallions that Mr. Dunham imported at one 

 time, and I should say that one-third of them were other 

 colors than gray. There were somejet black, others white, not 

 gray, and he had quite a number of bays. Those are the 

 only colors I have ever seen among Normandy horses. They 

 must be kept distinct from the Clyde horses, — Scotch, not 

 French, — which are being more bred in the Eastern States 

 than the Normans, and which are heavier about the limbs, 

 which have much more hair about the feet and legs, and are 

 slower, heavier horses every way. Among the Clydes you 

 will find diflerent colors, — chestnuts, sorrels and roans ; but 

 I liave seen in the Normandy horses nothing but black, bay 

 and gray, coming down to white. 



Mr. Shepard. I understood Mr. Russell to say that the 

 gray color was traceable to the Arabian, and that we cannot 

 aflbrd to dispense with that color for fear of losing the 

 strong blood of the Arabian. 



Maj. Alvord. Certainly four-fifths of all the horses that 

 come over from France are gray. I wish to say that the 

 mares foal very easily indeed. The mare that had this colt 

 was worked full-work up to within a month of the day she 

 had a colt, and half-worked, although the weather was pretty 

 hot in May, up to within a few days of her time, and was 

 worked again in the course of a couple of weeks after she 

 foaled. 



These horses are all admirably well-proportioned, and 

 there are small and large sizes. The extra large horses, that 

 the French are ready to sell, that you can buy cheapest in 

 France, are those which have generally gone into the West. 



