PURCHASING HORSES. 101 



sess the peculiar attribute we want for a particular 

 purpose. 



And again, where show is the desideratum, there are 

 many horses strikingly handsome at first sight, tliat 

 will not bear, in figurative terms, *' picking to pieces ;" 

 for, to carry on the metaphor, if they underwent such 

 process, we should find we must put them together 

 in far different way to form half a good sort. 



Some thirty-five years back there was a description 

 of horse much in use quite illustrative of this : I 

 allude to the barouche-horse, as he was thus termed. 

 He was not to be described as a coach-horse, though 

 he occasionally drew a coach ; neither is he repre- 

 sented by the kind now used in broughams. The old 

 coach-horse was, if we may judge by a few por- 

 traits (still at times to be found of him), an unde- 

 niably good sort for the purposes for which he was 

 used. 



We see some handsome and good-looking horses 

 in broughams now ; but the barouche horse was 

 neither of them. I will endeavour to describe what 

 he was. Nine pairs out of ten were then bays, of 



