AT THE UNIVERSITY OF LONDON. 
3 
present most valued breeds. Nor can we be said to be altoge¬ 
ther indebted to other countries for it; since we are, at present, in 
possession of a race of horses no where to be met with but in 
Great Britain. We first derived the parent stem from abroad, 
it is true ; but we have so improved the fruit—the produce 
thereof—that, not only are the parental characters in a great 
measure unredeemable, but the virtues or qualities of the pro¬ 
genitor are surpassed beyond all calculation in the offspring. This 
is an acknowledged truth ; and a truth of that description that 
richly deserves investigation. It therefore becomes a question, 
and a very interesting one, to what our present justly vaunted 
breed of horses is owing;?—since we do not deign to acknow- 
ledge either continental importation or original native production 
as the sole or even the most influential causes of these pheno¬ 
mena. 
There are three circumstances in particular by which the 
kinds or characters of animals, passing from one generation to 
another, appear to be influenced ;— climate , soil , and breed : let 
us, in the most cursory manner, inquire how far they seem to 
have been operative in the production of the British horse. 
That climate of itself has worked such wonders, no one, I ima¬ 
gine, would for a moment believe ; and especially when he be¬ 
comes informed that the best horses out of our country, Ara¬ 
bians, Barbs, See., are found in climates much hotter than our 
own, whose variable temperature, and sudden and constant 
vicissitude of weather, one would surely think, must be any thing 
but conducive to birth and beauty in the animal form. Is not 
France a much more even and congenial climate than England ? 
one that brings forth all sorts of vegetable productions, in the 
natural world, to much greater perfection than ours does ? And 
yet, its animals—its horses, bear no sort of comparison with 
ours. How is this? Surely, we cannot ascribe our superiority 
to climate! 
Is it, then, the soil ? That soil must have considerable influ¬ 
ence, there cannot be a doubt. On the nature of the soil de¬ 
pends the quality of the pasture ; and on the quality of the pas¬ 
ture will depend its property of nourishing and invigorating the 
animal body. The science of agriculture has enriched Britain 
with her choicest fruits: the feed of horses and of cattle has been 
brought to the very highest state of perfection, and even con¬ 
tending against more or less ungenial influence of climate. This 
is a fact that cannot be denied; and it is one of very great 
weight with us on the present occasion. 
How far soil, considered without any reference to climate, will 
serve to account for the provincial characteristics of our horses 
