LORD GODOLnilK'S ARABIAN. 2) 



placed the horses in the next heat. This seemed a thing sc 

 highly improbable, that he immediately had bets to a large 

 amount. Being called on to declare, he replied, " Eclipse first, 

 and the rest nowhere I" The event justified his prediction : all 

 the others were distanced by Eclipse with the greatest ease ; or, 

 in the language of the turf, they had no place. 



In the spring of the following year, he beat Mr. Wentworth's 

 Bucephalus, who had never before been conquered. Two days 

 afterwards he distanced Mr. Strode's Pensioner, a very good 

 horse ; and, in. the August of the same year, he won the great 

 subscription at York. No horse daring to enter against him, he 

 closed his short career of seventeen months, by walking over the 

 Newmarket coiu'se for the king's plate, on October the 18th, 

 1770. He was never beaten, nor ever paid forfeit, and won for 

 his owner more than twenty-five thousand pounds. 



Echpse was afterwards employed as a stallion, and produced 

 the extraordinary number of three hundred and thirty-four win- 

 ners, and these netted to their owners more than a hundred and 

 sixty thousand pounas exclusive of plates and cups. This fine 

 animal died in 1789, at the age of twenty-five years.* 



More than twenty years after the Darley Arabian, and when 

 the value of the Arabian blood was fully established, Lord Godol 

 phin possessed a beautiful, but singularly-shaped horse, which lit 

 called an Arabian, but which was really a Barb. His crest, 

 lofty and arched almost to a fault, will distinguish him from 

 every other horse. 



He had a sinking behind his shoulders, almost as peculiar, and 

 a corresponding elevation of the spine towards the loins. His 

 muzzle was uncommonly fine, his head beautifully set on, his 

 shoulders capacious, and his quarters well spread out. He was 

 picked up m France, where he was actually employed in draw- 

 ing a cart ; and when he was afterwards presented to Lord 

 Godolphin, he was in that nobleman's stud a considerable time 

 before his value was discovered. It was not im.til the birth of 

 Lath, one of the first horses of that period, that his excellence 

 began to be appreciated. He was then styled an Arabian, and 

 became, in even a greater degree than the Darley, the founder 

 of the modem thorough-bred horses. He died in 1753, at the 

 age of twenty-nine. 



An intimate friendship subsisted between him and a cat, which 

 either sat on his back when he was in the stable, or nestled as 

 closely to him as she could. At his death, the cat refused her 



■* The produce of King Herod, a descendant of Flying Ciiilders, was even 

 more numerous. He got no less than four hundred and ninety-seven win- 

 ners, who gained for their proprietors upwards of two hundred thousand 

 pounds. Highflyer was a son of King Herod 



