?82 MORGAN HORSE CH. XVI 



J 



the springiness and grace required in a saddle-horse, 

 or the highest class of drag leader, but to public- 

 coach purposes they are admirably adapted, and 

 several of the coaches running - out of New York 

 have been horsed by animals selected in Maine. 



In the New England States it is usual to describe 

 a horse by weight as well as by height, and the two 

 together give a better idea of him than the height 

 alone. 



A large sixteen-hand horse, rather clumsy for a 

 wheeler, will weigh 1120 pounds, but from 1070 to 

 1090 is heavy enough for an ordinary wheeler. A 

 fifteen-three horse, suitable for lead or wheel, will 

 weigh from 1000 to 1040 pounds ; and one fifteen- 

 two, from 950 to 990 pounds. The Morgan horses 

 of 1855 (described in Linsley's Morgan Horse), 

 when of fourteen-two hands, weighed from 1000 to 

 1050 pounds ; of fifteen hands, 1025 to 1076 pounds ; 

 and the average weight of twenty-two horses is 

 given at 1040 pounds, their heights ranging from 

 fourteen to fifteen hands ; these weights show that 

 the horses were very short-legged, since their bodies 

 were not clumsy. 



For the same breed of horses, from that date down 

 to the present time, the weights are about the same.* 



There is a type of carriage-horse now happily dis- 

 appearing from the show-ring and the best dealers' 

 stables, — awkward and long legged, with a head of 



* Rider and Driver, January 12, 1895. 



