k 



20 THE HORSE. 



and heaviest type, were the favorite coach horses of their day ; 

 the more spiry and lightly-built, of equal heiglit, vrere the hunt- 

 ers, in the days when the fox was hunted by his drag, unken- 

 nelled, and run half a dozen hours, or more, before he was 

 eitlier earthed, or worn out and worried to death. Then the short- 

 er, lower, and more closely ribbed up were the road hackneys ; 

 a style of horse unhappily now almost extinct, and having, un- 

 equally, substituted in its place, a wretched, weedy, half-bred 

 or three-quarter-bred beast, fit neither to go the pace with a 

 weight on its back, nor to last the time. 



From these Cleveland Bays, however, though in their pure 

 .state nearly extinct, a very superior animal has descended, which, 

 after several steps and gradations, has settled down into a family, 

 common throughout all Yorkshire, and more or less all the Mid- 

 land counties, as the farm-horse, and riding or driving horse of 

 the farmers, having about two crosses, more or less, of blood on 

 the original Cleveland stock. 



The first gradation, when pace became a desideratum with 

 hounds, was the stinting of the best Cleveland Bay mares to 

 good thoroughbred horses, with a view to the progeny turning 

 out hunters, troop-horses, or, in the last resort, stage-coach 

 horses, or, as they were termed, machiners. The most promis- 

 ing of these half-bred colts were kept as stallions ; and mares, 

 of the same type with their dams, stinted to them, produced the 

 improved English carriage horse of fifty years ago. 



The next stej) was the putting the half-bred fillies, by tho- 

 roughbreds out of Cleveland Bay mares, a second time, to tho- 

 roughbred stallions ; their progeny to become the hunters, 

 while themselves and their brothers were lowered into the car- 

 riage horses ; and the half-bred stallions, which had been the 

 getters of carriage horses, were degraded into the sires of the 

 new, improved cart-horse. 



From this, one step more brings us to the ordinary hunter 

 of the present day, of provincial hunting countries, for light 

 weights, and persons not Milling, or able, to pay the price of 

 thoroughbreds. These are the produce of the third and fourth 

 crosses of thorough blood on the improved mares, descended in 

 the third or fourth degree from the Cleveland Bay stock ; and 

 are in every way superior, able and beautiful animals, possess- 



