52 Tire HOR8K. 



as well or as badly as lie could, according to tlie fashion of all 

 the other States in which I have journeyed — I contrived to pick 

 up some information, concerning the quick-working, active, 

 powerful, well-conditioned, and sound animals, which excited 

 both my wonder and my admiration. 



My wonder! for that, in my stage-coach experiences in New 

 York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Upper Canada, from the 

 year 1831 to 1836, of which I had enjoyed considerable oppor- 

 tunity — having once voyaged in what was called, by a cruel 

 irony, the Telegraph Line, from Albany to Bufftilo, through, in 

 three days and two nights — I had formed any thing but a favor- 

 able estimate of American stage-coaching. 



My admiration! for that over roads, though very well kept for 

 the state of the country, W'hich would have made an English 

 whip open his eyes, and probably his mouth also, in impreca- 

 tions both loud and deep, and through a very rough line of 

 country, so far as hills and long stages were concerned, I never 

 saw any horses, in my life, do their work more honestly, more 

 regularly, or more quickly. 



The rate of going was nine miles, including stoppages ; to do 

 which it was necessary to make between ten and eleven over 

 the road ; the time was punctually kept — as punctually as on 

 the best English mail routes, at that time, when the English 

 mail was the wonder of the world ; and I have no hesitation in 

 saying that ten and a half to eleven miles an hour, over those 

 roads, is fully equal to thirteen or fourteen over the English 

 turnpikes, as they were at the time concerning which I am 

 writing. And I speak, on this subject, with the conviction that 

 I speak knowingly ; for, between the years 1825 and 1831, there 

 were not a great many fast coaches on the flying roads of the 

 day, on the boxes of which I have not sat, nor a few of the fast- 

 est, on which I have not handled the ribbons. 



All these horses were evidently of the very breed and stamp 

 which I describe ; and I learned, on inquiry, that it is from the 

 region I have named, the northern part of Massachusetts, namely, 

 Vermont, and perhaps some portion of New Hampshire, that 

 most of the horses came, and that from those quarters, moreover, 

 is the origin of the horse of Maine, almost without admixture. 



Whence this admirable stock of horses came, or how it has 



