ON BREEDING. 
196 
¥ 
hybred, which, both in her form and colour , bore marks of the 
mixed breeds. The chesnut mare was subsequently parted with 
to Sir Gore Ousely, who twice bred from her by a black Arabian, 
and the progeny, strange to relate, exhibited in their colour a 
striking resemblance to the quagga, of a bay colour, and dis¬ 
tinguished by the dark stripes across the forehand, the dark bars 
across the back of the fore legs, and the short, stiff*, and upright 
mane. A similar circumstance* is related of a sow belonging to 
D. Giles Esq., which was bred from by a boar of the wild breed, 
of a dark chesnut colour: the progeny shewed a striking re¬ 
semblance to the boar in colour. The sow was afterwards bred 
from by two of Mr. Western’s boars, and in both instances chesnut 
marks were prevalent in the litter. 
We have also a remarkable instance in the sacred writings of 
the effect of the imagination in conception : it tends to shew 
what influence the mind has in producing the external charac¬ 
ters of coloured covering, by Jacob laying speckled, and spotted, 
and ring-streaked rods of poplar in the watering troughs, about 
the time when the stronger cattle coupled and conceived: these 
striking their imagination as they drank, made them conceive a 
spotted offspring. The effects of the imagination is oftentimes 
observed in pregnant women, by certain marks being produced 
on the child, which are supposed to derive their origin from the 
longings of the mother. 
We insert the two last examples without much comment: for 
The former one we have the authority of the inspired writer 
Moses; the truth of the latter is vouched for by almost every old 
woman in England; and neither of them are a whit more impro¬ 
bable than the two communications of the Earl of Morton, in the 
“ Philosophical Transactions/' whose authority is indisputable. 
For further information, we must wait until the internal proper¬ 
ties of matter, which composes the animal body, are further 
developed— 
a Qui potiut reruni cognoscere causas;” 
for if we were to transmit our imagination to a fancied period, 
when horses existed but of one kind, 
“ Incipiant silvae cum prim uni surgere, cum que 
Kara per ignotos client animaiia montes,” 
we could not then better explain how the various colours which 
now diversify the horses of the whole earth have originated from 
one common stock. 
“ Why docs one climate and one soil endue 
The blushing poppy with a crimson hue. 
Yet leave the lily pale, and tinge the violet blue 
Philosophical Transactions. 
