THE HORSE. 143 



use of chosen level roads ; at length, I fortunately- 

 interested the attention of Robson the dealer, who 

 made the experiment in a match with his mare Phe- 

 nomena, setting up a feather from the training stables 

 at Smitham Bottom, and making choice of a proper 

 road ; the mare in Consequence, though not of the 

 first class for speed, performed upwards of eighteen 

 miles in one hour; this improvement of adopting 

 light weight, and the avoidance of hills and rough 

 roads, so destructive to the limbs, joints, and feet, of 

 the trotter, has since become the established custom 

 [in all regular trotting matches. To preserve a horse 

 of this description any length of time, in a state of 

 soundness, requires the utmost skill and care, par- 

 ticularly of the legs and feet, with the never failing 

 relief an annual run at grass. The true trot is per- 

 formed with a well bent knee, and a quick step; not 

 i however with a step so quick and short, that the 

 'horse seems to put his foot down precisely in the 

 same place whence he took it up ; far less must he 

 trot with a stride and an unbent knee, a mode of pro- 

 gression so much admired in Germany; as to trot- 

 ting, that form never comes to any thing. There is, 

 however, the variety of the running trotter ; some of 

 those have great speed, and will trot their course 

 through ; it is easier to name these, than to describe 

 their mode of going, they do not bend their knees so 

 much as the common and fair trotter, and appear to 

 run in our bipedal acceptation of the term. None of 

 our horses are now taught to amble, and natural 

 padders, of which I never knew but one, are no longer 

 heard of. Half a century past, the utmost speed for 



