264 THE HORSE. 



previous centuries. It may, however, be safely 

 averred, that the foundations of the regular racing 

 system were laid between the reigns of James the 

 First and Charles the Second, Newmarket, at some 

 part of that period, becoming, as it still continues, its 

 head quarters. The species of horse used in Great 

 Britain, for the purpose of racing, was from the be- 

 ginning, the silken haired courser of South Eastern 

 Europe, the origin of which was African, either Ara- 

 bian or Barb ; and this apparently without any, save 

 fortuitous and accidental admixtures with the indi- 

 genous breeds of this country. The late Dr. Parry 

 and others have been misled on the supposition of 

 such mixture, for the purpose of increasing the size 

 and substance of the foreign horses ; but that advan- 

 tage has resulted purely from the incrassating and 

 improving nature of our gramineous soil, our superior 

 and more nourishing food and systematic attention. 



Most of the breeds of the Levant, from the origin 

 above stated, were by nature coursers or racers, in 

 our common phrase, blood horses, namely, the Turk- 

 ish, Cappadocian, Phrygian, or Syrian, Egyptian, and 

 also the Persian breeds. Our horsecourses, during 

 the reign of the Stuarts, imported those breeds, and 

 some few of the Spanish, which in those days, under 

 the name of jennets, were Barbs bred in Spain and 

 preserved pure from any northern European crosses. 

 The superiority of the original, a horse of the Desert, 

 Arabian, or Barb, seems to have been a more modern 

 discovery ; in probability, not apprehended, until the 

 arrival and trial as a stallion, of Mr. Darley's Ara- 

 bian, in the reign of Anne. Indeed previously, some 



