490 
ON BREEDING. 
in political economy is still visible in that valuable code of juris, 
prudence winch is the pride of every Englishman. They seen 
to have made considerable improvements in agriculture, and t( 
have directed their attention to horses in particular, as a law was 
pi omulgated in the reign of Athelstan, a. d. 925, “ prohibiting:* 
le exportation of horses, except they were designed as presents 
ihese must have been the native kind, or the prohibition woulc 
have been needless; for our commerce was at that time too limited 
to receive improvement from any but the German kind, to which 
country their own breed could be of no value/’ 
The dynasty of the Danes was of brief duration: they are 
noticed m historygather as destroyers and barbarians than friend? 
to social order But on the accession of William the Conqueroi 
to the crown of England, that monarch directed his immediate 
attention, in a beneficial way, to every thing appertaining to the 
aits; and by producing a spirit of commerce and foreign exchange 
became the means of introducing foreign horses into the count™! 
Roger f de Belesme, Earl of Shrewsbury, created by William 
the Conqueror is the first on record : he introduced the Spanish 
stalhons into Ins estate in Powisland, from which that part of 
Wales was for many ages celebrated for a swift and generous 
lace of horses. Michael Drayton, contemporary with Shakspeare, 
sings their excellence m the sixth part of his Polyalbion ; and 
Diraldus Cambrensis, who lived in the reign of Henry II, takes 
‘ In haen terlia YV allice portione quae Powisia dicitur sunt equitia neron- 
tima, et equi emissana laudatissima, de Hispaniensium equorum generosi- 
ate quos ohm Comes Slopesbunce llobertus de Belesme, in fines istos adduci 
curaverat, ongmaliter propagati.” aaauci 
The principal step towards improvement was produced by the 
spintot chivalry which the Normans introduced to our island; from 
that time we can trace a succession of causes and events, which, 
with difteient degrees of influence, contributed to improve the 
breed of horses. But the progress of improvement was slow till 
the separation of the interests of the lords from their vassals, 
'' ", 1 ' vas | IC ste P towards abolishing the feudal system •_ 
the husbandman now became farmer of the same fields which he 
had formerly been compelled to cultivate for the benefit of another • 
and the land, by being divided into smaller farms, became con- 
siderably meliorated. 
In the reigns of Henry the Seventh and Eighth, Arabian and 
Barbary horses were imported into the country. 
The next change happened during the reign of James the 
Pennant’s Zoology. 
t Ibid. 
