SPANISH BLOOD. 15 



been n good one, but for two objections — either of them the 

 fatal. 



Firstly — it should have been shown that the stock had been 

 improving constantly, by each successive cross of pure blood, 

 since the unknown admixture, but that cannot be shown. Nor 

 is there the slightest reason to suspect that Marske was a better 

 horse than Squirt, or Squirt than Bartlett's Childers, or than 

 Snake, his maternal grandfather, who was only one generation 

 removed from blood which cannot be authenticated ; the daugh- 

 ter of Hautboy, Snake's dam, not being traceable on the side 

 of her dam. 



Secondly — it should be established, that in the case of these 

 remotest ancestors and ancestresses of unknown blood, that 

 blood was base ; whereas, so far from that being the case, the 

 reverse of that proposition is almost certain. 



There are a dozen mares on the old Turf records, not as un- 

 known, but known, under their names, as for instance, the old 

 Montagu Mare, the old Yintner Mare, the mare above quoted, 

 daughter to Hautboy, Bright's Koau, the Lonsdale Tregon- 

 well mare, and others, of whom either nothing can be authenti- 

 cated on either side, or, if any thing, on the side of their sires 

 only. 



Many of these mares were the best runners of their own 

 day, as their progeny have been in all after days ; and we have 

 sufficient evidence at this period, from the Marquis of New- 

 castle's work and others, that racing was fully established, that a 

 distinct breed of running horses existed, and that the science of 

 breeding for the turf was already partially, if not — as I should 

 say, from a careful examination of his writings — pretty thor- 

 oughly understood. 



These horses were, it seems, nearly, if not entirely, of pure 

 Spanish blood, previous to the admixture of directly imported 

 Barb blood, which Newcastle distinctly prefers to Arabian. 



How far the imported Spanish mares and horses were, at 

 that date, of pure Barb blood, it is now impossible to decide. 

 We know the Andalusian horse was a very high-caste animal, of 

 Barb descent, and I think it probable if the archives of Spain 

 could be consulted, that the royal studs and Haras of Cordova 

 would be proved to have contained pure Barbs, and nothing 



