THE TEEM " GREAT HOESE." 89 



Miss Strickland, however, errs widely, and not unnaturally, 

 as a lady is not expected to be skilled in the dialect of the 

 horse-market, in the interpretation she puts on the words of the 

 old chronicler. Hall, and on the character which she attaches 

 to the Flemish Breed. 



The term great courser^ as used in the text, or as it is, per- 

 haps, more frequently written, great horse, means no more than 

 war horse, as opposed to palfrey or running-horse, and has no 

 especial reference to the size, bulk, or breed of the animal, 

 though doubtless the war-horse was a larger and heavier animal 

 than that used for mere amusement. 



Afterwards the term gi^eat horse, simply, is to be understood 

 as the horse broken to the manege ; it is a term, familiar to any 

 one acquainted with the old English writers, to say of a young 

 gentleman, who had finished his physical education, that he 

 could fence and ride the great horse, meaning that he could per- 

 fectly ride the manege. 



It is true, that the inferior men-at-arms, at this period, were 

 mounted on Flemish horses, but the princes and nobles and 

 other knights of renown rode Spani'sh or English horses, with a 

 considerable strain of desert blood, possessing, through Flemish 

 and other strains, bone and bulk sufficient to carry warriors in 

 their panoply. 



But it is not true that the Flemish horse of that day, or 

 later, when Marlborough at the head of the Dutch and English 

 cavalry, mounted on Flemish chargers, rode over the superb 

 French gendarmerie of Maison Roi at Malplaquet, bore any 

 resemblance whatever to the dray-horse of to-day, though he be 

 also Flanders descent, any more than did the " Flanders mares" 

 which were the highest aspiration of the extravagant court- 

 beauty in the days of Poj)e. 



To any person, who knows any thing of cavalry tactics, it 

 is evident that the utmost speed, compatible with the ability to 

 carry weight, is the desideratum in a charger. And every one 

 who has ever seen an Enghsh dray-horse knows that he cannot 

 trot, much less gallop ; while I myself remember that within the 

 present half century the old unimproved English carriage horse, 

 high-stepping and awkwardly moving, was doing great work if 

 he trotted six miles an hour, and could by no means be brought 



