but Arabs and Barbs were not imported into England in 

 any number until the Restoration, in 1660. James I. 

 (1603-1625) had procured such horses, and Charles I. 

 (1625-1649) followed his example. 



Oliver Cromwell, opposed though he was t,o sport — 

 as witness his various proclamations forbidding race 

 meetings — was far too shrewd a man to allow prejudice to 

 weigh against national interests. He might regard racing 

 and its accompaniments of wagering and cock-fighting 

 with all the Puritan's disapproval, but he could not fail to 

 see that the horse-breeding industry was so intimately 

 associated with racing that one could hardly exist without 

 the other. 



The war had gone far to denude the country of horses, 

 and Cromwell, as a statesman and a soldier, took measures 

 to repair the injury by importing the best stock money 

 could procure, even though the proceeding meant 

 encouragement of the horse-racing repugnant to puri- 

 tanical views. 



It had been intended to break up and disperse the 

 Royal Stud Charles I. had maintained at Tutbury, in 

 Staffordshire. A list of the horses was actually made 

 with this object by the Commissioners who were sent for 

 the purpose, as soon as Cromwell came into power. 



Cromwell, however, afterwards decided that the Stud 

 should be preserved as public property, in order to breed 

 horses for the nation, and very soon after we find him 

 sending his own Stud-master, Mr. Place, abroad to 

 purchase Eastern horses, of which Place's White Turk is 

 the most famous. 



It was Charles II. (1660-1685), who imported Arab, 

 Barb, and Turkish stallions and mares in quantity that 

 made a real impression upon our native stock. The 

 importation of Eastern mares — " Royal mares," as they 



