XIV 

 THE CANADIAN PACE.R 



In many of the fastest American trotters, especially those bred in Ken- 

 tucky, Tennessee and Indiana, or from stock that came from these States, 

 there has always been an unknown element of pacing blood. A small portion, 

 the Hiatogas for example, trace to Virginia, but by far the greater part has been 

 recognized as Canadian. The Hiatoga and the Canadian were, in size at least, 

 decidedly different. Pollock's Hiatoga, the first one known to have gone 

 to Kentucky, is advertised, 1822, as sixteen and one-fourth hands high. Case's 

 Hiatoga is advertised in Virginia, 1814, as sixteen hands, and Harris' Hia- 

 toga is advertised, 1816, as sixteen hands. Hardly any of the Canadian 

 pacers were over fifteen hands. Instead of being large and rangy horses, it is 

 well known that they were compact and roundly-built, like the Morgan. 



The first of these Canadian pacers known to have gone to Kentucky 

 was Copperbottom, foaled 1809, and taken to Kentucky, probably in 1816. 

 Then came a succession of similar horses Tom Hal, Pilot, Tecumseh, Davy 

 Crockett, Corbeau, and a large number of lesser note. 



We have no doubt but that the source of these pacers in Virginia was the 

 Narragansett, crossed with the blood stock, and perhaps also with the native 

 horses of that State, themselves trained to pace, if not of pacing origin. 

 That this native stock paced naturally is shown by the advertisements of that 

 period, and the testimony which has been handed down to us in books of travel. 

 The pacing blood that produced such great results in Kentucky was not, how- 

 ever, so far as known, that which came from Virginia, nor that which came from 

 Maryland, although considerable of this latter went to Kentucky ; but was the 

 pacing blood alone that came from the Province of Quebec. This certainly is a 

 remarkable fact, one of the most significant that appears in the history of the 

 trotting or pacing horse of America, and as yet never explained. Indeed, we 

 know of no intelligent attempt to explain it. Occasionally a superficial writer, 

 who never looked up any facts, and who knows nothing whatever about the 

 subject, has said that this blood was derived from the Canadian stock, imported 

 originally to Canada from France ; and perhaps states, as further explanation, 

 that the Normandy horse was derived in part from the Andalusian, and so consis- 

 ted of Arabian or Barb blood. To a student of the subject in Canada this ex- 

 planation is grotesquely ridiculous. It is sustained neither by the facts 

 of history, v nor by the laws of breeding. The original stock imported to 

 Canada from France in 1665, and later, was very plain and rugged, after 



