CARRIAGE-HORSES 109 



of great profit to the Yorkshire breeder, an animal that needs 

 only to be seen to be admired, to be used to be appreciated." 



Hackneys. 



Hackneys, the third great source from which the supply 

 of carriage-horses is drawn, seem to be an endless bone of 

 contention in the horsey world, dividing it into two camps, 

 the one almost worshipping the animal, whilst the other 

 will not have it at any price ; the chief reason probably being 

 that while the best of the breed are fine animals, there is a 

 terrible tailing off amongst the inferior sort, which, as most 

 breeders know to their sorrow, are much easier produced 

 than the prize-winners. There is also a flashiness about the 

 hackney, which is in fact the very essence of its being, and 

 appeals more to the foreigner than to the average Englishman, 

 for there is no doubt that as a race we do not like to attract 

 notice to ourselves, and prefer to slip quietly along, attending 

 to our own business, if possible unnoticed by the passer-by. 

 But the hackney will not permit of our so doing. He, at 

 any rate, means to be looked at and admired! And so it 

 comes to pass that the hackney is valued by the admiration- 

 loving foreigner and many Englishmen, while others sneer 

 at it and give it a wide berth. The hackney has been 

 evolved out of the old roadster, and appears to have had his 

 origin in Lincolnshire, and spread from there to Norfolk 

 and Yorkshire ; but in the last county they have been much 

 localised, seldom spreading far from the neighbourhood of 

 Market Weighton, in the East Riding. The best of them 

 have a good deal of thoroughbred blood in their veins, and 

 the great progenitor of all, the famous Old Shales, was got 

 by Blaze, a pure-bred son of Flying Childers, out of a 

 strong common-bred mare in Lincolnshire. There is a 

 belief in the Yorkshire Wolds that the hackneys owe their 

 high-stepping action entirely to the cross of cart-horse 

 blood in their pedigree, and probably the compact form, 

 wide chest, and round buttocks were derived from the same 

 source. Crossing with pony blood produced that shortness 

 which is one of their great characteristics, and which is so 



