98 Till!; iioKtjK. 



that the veiy authors wlio attack him, borrow his descriptions 

 of the various races, without acknowledgment, 



" And the Marquis of Serai vo " — says he, in his preface- — 

 " Master of horse to his Highness, and Governor of the castle 

 of Antwerp, told his Highness, that he had asked me, ' what 

 horses I liked best ? ' and that I had answered, ' there were 

 good and bad of all nations ; but that the Barbs were the gen- 

 tlemen of the horse kind, and Spanish horses, the princes.' " 



In commenting, afterward, on the various races, and their 

 fitness for the stud, he thus speaks of the Spanish horse, and 

 thus of the Barb. I quote these various j)assages, for two rea- 

 sons, which I shall explain hereafter. " If he be well chosen, 

 I assure you he is the noblest horse in the world. First, there 

 is no horse so curiously shaped, all over from head to croup. 

 He is the most beautiful that can be. For he is not so thin and 

 ladylike as the Barb, nor so gross as the Neapolitan ; but be- 

 tween both. He is of great spirit, and of great courage, and 

 docile ; hath the proudest walk, the proudest trot, and best ac- 

 tion in his trot ; the loftiest gallop, the swiftest careers, and is 

 the lovingest and gentlest horse, and fittest for a king in a day 

 of triumph to show himself to his people, or in the head of an 

 army, of any horse in the world. 



" Therefore, there is no horse so fit to breed on, as a Span- 

 iard ; either for the manege, tlie war, am^bling for the pad, 

 hunting, or for running. Conqueror was of a Spanish horse., 

 Shotten Herring was of a Spanish horse. Butler was of a 

 Spanish iiorse, and Peacock was of a Spanish mare ; and these 

 beat all the horses in their time, so much as no horse ever ran 

 near them. 



" I say he is absolutely the best stallion in the world, for all 

 these things I have formerly named, if you do wisely appro- 

 priate such mares to him, as shall be fit for uses such as you 

 would have your breed, and so he is fit for all breeds, except to 

 breed cart horses. 



" The king of Spain hath many, but his best is at Cordova 

 in Andalusia, where he hath above three hundred mares and 

 colts, as my Lord Cottington told me ; and besides those of his 

 majesty, there are other most excellent races, not only of noble- 

 men, but also of private gentlemen." 



