28 LIGHT HORSES: BREEDS AND MANAGEMENT. 



horses or pads, hunters, running horses, racers, race horses, 

 gallopers, welter horses, managed horses, chargers, troop 

 horses, post hacks or post horses, trotters, cantering hacks or 

 canterers, horses which carry double, cobs, galloways, ponies 

 and mountain-merlins. There is fortunately no necessity for 

 analysing the above rather intricate list of varieties and sub- 

 varieties in the present instance, the object held in view in 

 making the quotation being fully served by the fact that the 

 existence of the Hackney as a recognised breed a hundred 

 years ago is amply demonstrated. John Lawrence, more- 

 over, in his " History of the Riding Horse" again alludes to the 

 hackney as a recognised and valued variety, and connects him 

 with the roadster a designation which apparently is there 

 used for the first time in English equine history, although so 

 far back as the year 1600, Hakluyt makes use of the ex- 

 pression "reader" in his collection of travels, which goes a 

 long way towards proving that the title was in vogue in 

 America at an even earlier date. There can, however, be no 

 reason for doubting that the designations, hackney and nag, 

 were interchangeable terms when applied to horses during the 

 past century, and certainly they have remained so ever since, 

 as in many parts of the country they are applied indis- 

 criminately to animals of the same variety. According to Mr. 

 H. F. Euren's carefully compiled and most valuable introduc- 

 tion to the first volume of the Hackney Horse Society's Stud 

 Book, the expression nag is the oldest surviving appellation 

 for the active riding horse in this country, and the word, he 

 informs his readers with evident correctness, is derived from 

 the Anglo-Saxon word hnegan, to neigh. Subsequently, Mr. 

 Euren proceeds to state, the Normans when they took posses- 

 sion of this country, introduced their own word, haquenee or 

 hacquenee, which was recognised in England so far back as 

 the year 1303. As a proof of this, Mr. Euren quotes the 

 following extract from the " Vision of Piers Plowman," 

 written in 1350, " ac Hakeneyes hadde thei none, bote 

 Hakeneyes to hyre." The adoption of the expression 



