Breeding and Management of Horses on a Farm. 509 
cipally required in those animals which are exclusively bred for 
agricultural purposes, or for heavy draught of any kind ; while 
not only is strength a most important feature in the horse likely 
to make a hunter that will probably some day put a large sum 
of money into the pockets of his owner, but he must likewise be 
noted for speed, enduiing powers, and activity in every pace, 
united to beauty of form, so far as it can be obtained ; and hence, 
in breeding liunters, it is advisable to select such stallions as have 
both a good pedigree, and are known not only to possess the 
above qualifications in an eminent degree themselves, but also to 
be the descendants of animals conspicuous for the stoutness of 
their blood, whether in the field or on the turf. For this reason 
it will be requisite to take a separate view of the different qua- 
lities to be sought in the sires and dams of each of the above 
breeds, by a careful attention to which the breeder may in some 
measme secure himself from the risk attendant upon breeding 
from any sort of animal in his possession, and which may have 
been selected without reference to procreation, and avoid the 
almost inevitable loss consequent upon leaving to chance what 
should be the result of scientific discrimination. 
Let us first take a view of the most material points requiring 
consideration in the hunter, or nearly, if not quite, thorough- bred 
horse, and then proceed to notice those which constitute the chief 
points of excellence in the horse destined entirely for draught. 
The great improvement which has taken place in the breed of 
hounds during the last thirty years, and the pace at which they 
now go, renders a corresponding degree of excellence in the 
hunter absolutely necessary to those who desire to be properly 
carried in the chase ; and hence the old style of hunter, a close- 
knit, hall-bred horse, possessed of many very excellent points, 
but deficient in the one grand requisite of swiftness, has almost 
entirely disappeared and given way to an animal of far more 
blood, and capable, from that circumstance alone, of vast endu- 
rance and considerable speed. Indeed a great number of first- 
rate hunters of the present day are thorough-bred, or at most 
have a stain in their pedigree so remote as to place them nearly 
on a par with the horse of full blood in every respect, save that 
of being able to claim a place in the stud-book among h(jrses of 
unspotted lineage; and this very defect is to many half-bred 
horses (or, as they are termed, cock-tails) a great advantage, a 
certain allowance of weight being made to them in most races 
for which they may be entered, as some hunter-stakes, and most 
of the races for which thorough-bred horses contend. As it is 
not my intention to enter in this paper upon the subject of breeding 
for the turf, it is needless to advert to the subject further than to 
show the agriculturist that, for more reasons than one, the better 
