CHAPTER IX 



AMERICAN BREEDS 



Native American Horses. — Conditions in this country have 

 proven most congenial for the production of horses, yet there 

 were none inhabiting this continent when it was discovered by 

 Columbus. This is all the more remarkable in view of the fact 

 that fossil remains of a prehistoric horse have been found in 

 abundance in different parts of this country. It is believed that 

 the horses originally on this continent passed over what is now 

 Behring Straits, into Asia, during the early ages. 



The restocking of America was coincident with its explora- 

 tion and colonization. Columbus landed horses on his second 

 expedition, but it is not known whether or not they ever reached 

 the mainland. The horses brought by Cortez, in his conquest 

 of Mexicoi, in 1519, are credited with being the first to gain 

 American soil. In 1527, Cabeza de Vaca brought horses to St 

 Augustine, Florida, which were afterward liberated. De Soto's 

 expedition was equipped with horses when he discovered the 

 Mississippi in 1541, although the majority of them were killed 

 for their flesh after De Soto's death. These Spanish horses were 

 derivatives from a Barb foundation with which Spain was orig- 

 inally stocked. 



Horses, presumably of the old JSTorman and Breton stock, 

 were taken by the French into JSTova Scotia in 1604, and four 

 years later were introduced into Canada. One stallion and six 

 mares. Thoroughbred, reached Virginia with the English in 

 1607. In 1625 Dutch horses, jiossibly the black trotter of Fries- 

 land, arrived at New Netherlands. In 1629 the first horses to 

 inhabit New England came with the English to Boston. This 

 was the composite origin of the American horse stock, out of 

 which our breeds have been evolved. 



As early as 1678 the descendants of horses that had escaped 

 from, or were liberated by the early Spanish expeditions, were 

 ranging wild in great bands over the prairies of this continent. 



The American breeds of horses are the Standardbred, includ- 

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