88 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, 1892. 



power of speed ; and the system carried on results in very fast stock, 

 such as the Thorough-bred English horse of to-day. This is called 

 breeding " in and in." But in producing an especial quality likethis, 

 we also produce others which are not always beneficial. We rarely 

 get strength combined with speed ; hence, the stronger horses being 

 slower are not bred from, and, as we can see any day in Engknd now, 

 we get any number of race horses possessed of maiTellous powers of 

 speed for a short distance, carrying a very light weighty but only with 

 a very few, who can gallop, say, five miles with 14 stone up. When we 

 do get them, they are of coarse the best animals in the world^ but they 

 are rare. To get this speed too, stallions and mares are employed that 

 are unsound and of delicate constitution, hence masy Thorough-bred 

 English horses go wrong in training, either lame, or get knocked up. 

 In cattle this is very marked in Short Horns, a breed produced by "in 

 and in" breeding. They are immense animals, growing very big while 

 still merebabiesand fatten very rapidly ,hencethey shouldbe extremely 

 valuable and profitable to farmers, but, unfortunately they have a 

 tendency to tuberculosis, which has been so much enhanced by " in 

 and in" breeding that it has now become a perfect plague amongst 

 Short Horns. Many breeds of dogs, bred to win prizes at Shows, 

 are similarly affected with hereditary tendencies to certain diseases. 



Throwing bach. — An animal is said to throw back, when he 

 inherits some quality from an ancestor which his own parents have 

 not. If a colt have a big head, and his sire and dam small or ordi- 

 nary sized ones, we frequently find on looking back that his grandsire 

 or dam, or great-grandsire or dam was possessed of such a peculi- 

 arity. It is the same with other qualities. 



Crossing. — If we put a mare of one breed to a stallion of another, 

 it is called "crossing," and the progeny is "half-bred." A "half- 

 bred" hunter for instance is a horse whose sire was a Thorough- 

 bred. Mongrel is a horse, neither the dam or sire of which is 

 Thorough-bred in the sense of pure bred, and therefore the 

 progeny is of very mixed blood, in fact, no particular breed at all. 

 He is generally too an animal of low courage, small powers of 

 endurance, and often vicious. If he is well shaped, it is a mere 

 chance, as he may throw back to any ill- shaped progenitor or perhaps 

 combine the defects of several. 



