120 Report upon the Spring Show of Thoroughbred Stallions 
smaller mares. It is a somewhat noteworthy circumstance that, 
while there is a growing fashion in favour of big horses for 
hunters, there is among all classes at the same time a greater 
demand for smaller ones for harness purposes. The " Vil- 
lage," " Rustic," " Battlesden," and " Polo " carts, which are 
pressed upon our notice in every sporting newspaper, are rarely 
drawn by any animal over 15 hands. JNIiniature broughams do not 
need the upstanding coach-horse that our grandfathers used to 
drive ; the institution of polo has given an impetus to dealing in 
ponies of 14 hands; so that in one way and another there is 
not the demand for full-sized horses that there once was, except 
for the hunting field, where they are in greater request than ever. 
The result of this is, that the farmer has followed on the prevail- 
ing fashion of driving undersized animals, and rarely, unless he 
be a hunting man himself, possesses the sort of mare likely to 
breed a weight-carrying hunter. In company with a friend, I 
recently visited some inn stables on three market days, to see 
what kind of horses had brought the farmers to market. We 
found 38 mares altogether, and not more than 10 of these 
exceeded 15 hands : of the 10 there was only one that could by 
any possibility be deemed a fitting brood-mare for hunters. 
May not this state of things explain what is called the 
" scarcity of horses " ? Let any one attend the periodical sales 
at Tattersall's, or Aldridge's in London, Tattersall's at Rugby, 
Warner's at Leicester, Deacon's at Swindon, or the sales at any 
other repository, and it will be seen that mere light-weight 
horses are a drug in the market, and cannot possibly pay for 
breeding. Any one who is content with an animal standing 
about 15 '1 at the outside, and capable of carrying not more 
than about 11 stone 7 lbs., may mount himself almost for his 
own price. Whether breeding can be made to pay, or whether 
it cannot, it is at all events clear that nothing but failure 
will await the breeding of these undersized horses ; they are 
consequently not the class to be encouraged. 
The Newcastle show enabled people to see, if they ever 
doubted the fact, that there are plenty of sires about the country 
good enough to get the best class of weight-carrying hunters, and 
if breeders use the premium-winners, they have the guarantee 
that the horse is perfectly sound. At Newcastle there were two 
horses cast by the veterinary officials as unsound ; yet they have 
been much used in their own district, and, in one case, the 
stock are very much liked. What the unsoundness was is not 
known to the writer ; but does not this indicate the usefulness 
of the shows at which stallions are subject to a vigorous ex- 
amination ? The owners of the horses in question were 
probably in ignorance of any defect in their horses, for had they 
