74. 
the number exported ten or fifteen years 
previously (say about the year 1858), Mr. 
Phillips replied that the foreigners had 
always taken as many as they could get. 
Horses of roadster stamp are not less 
necessary to the efficiency of the British 
army than to Continental armies; but while 
the Committee displayed the greatest care 
and assiduity in their investigations con- 
cerning the causes of dearth in saddle 
horses, they passed over the not less impor- 
tant question of harness horse supply, as 
though holding that a matter of no account. 
It is to be regretted that the Committee 
did not ask questions as to the enormous 
number of mares purchased for France, 
Germany, Russia and Austria, and also 
enquire concerning the use to which the 
mares are put in those countries. The 
answers would have been instructive, for it 
is now well known that fifteen out of every 
twenty of them were medium and heavy 
weight hunter mares—-many of them stale 
for riding to hounds, but in every other 
respect suitable for breeding. These foreign 
buyers had no prejudices: they bought the 
mares with the view of breeding stock of 
the type most suitable for the requirements 
of their respective countries : the mares had 
