56 HANDBOOK OF THE TURF. 



muscles; want of symmetry and commanding presence; an 

 miintelligent head ; low and coarse withers ; bull neck ; a 

 short top to the hind quarters coupled with droop, not to be 

 compared to gentle obliquity which gives the muscular area 

 and power in trotting and racing. 



Coat. The external natural covering of hair upon the 

 horse. The word especially refers to the color. To the 

 investigation of this subject, Goubaux and Barrier of Paris, in 

 their great work on the Exterior of the Horse, have given 

 very minute studies, as a result of which they formulated a 

 classification which has mainly been adopted, although in a 

 modified form, in the presentation here given. A scientific 

 description of the coats groups them in three classes, viz: 1, 

 Primitive, or those already formed soon after the colt is foaled ; 

 2, Derived, or those which appear some time after birth, and 

 are due to the introduction of white into a primitive coat ; 3, 

 Conjugate, or those characterized by the presence upon the 

 sams animal of two primitive and two derived coats. I. In 

 the first class there are three divisions: 1, simple coats as 

 black, sorrel; 2, composite, as those formed of hairs of two 

 colors — one black for mane, tail and extremities; others — • 

 yellow, red or gray for body, as Isabella, bay, mouse cf )lor ; 3, 

 mixed, formed by dark hairs upon each of which are found 

 two different colors, the yellow more or less light at the base, 

 the black at the summit. Of the blacks there is the true or 

 ordinary black, and rusty black. The former is dark, uniform 

 without any reflection ; the rusty is dull, reddish in the sun, 

 washed, hard to distinguish from brown. Sorrel or chestnut, 

 which consists of golden, fawn, and reddish-brown hairs, (by 

 some it is called coffee and milk color), fawn-sorrel; washed 

 sorrel ; cherry sorrel, (reddish tint) ; chestnut-sorrel ; maroon- 

 sorrel; burnt sorrel, or color of roasted coffee; Isabella, bay 

 and mouse color. The Isabella has a coat of two distinct 

 colors, on the body yellow or yellowish, on the extremities — 

 from the knee and hock doMm — mane and tail, black. This 

 color is also called dun. Bay differs from Isabella because the 

 yellow hairs are replaced by red ones. The varieties are light 

 bay ; ordinary bay, (of a distinctly red color) ; cherry, blood 

 and mahogany bay, darker than ordinary bay, and all essen- 

 tially alike ; chestnut bay, (the color of a ripened chestnut) ; 

 maroon bay, deeper and fresher upon the upper parts of the 

 body; dark bay. bordering upon browm; brown bay, almost 

 black. Mouse color is formed by two colors, the body ashy 

 gray, similar to the colors of a mouse, legs from the knee and 

 hock down, black, as in the bay. XL Derived coats. These 



