50 REVIEW—DARVILL ON THE TREATMENT AND 
such language as trainers and jockeys .best understand the force 
and meaning of. 
Speaking of the formation of the English race-horse,” Mr, 
Darvill says, he prefers one of the height of fifteen hands, or, 
at most, fifteen hands one inch ; and one that has ‘‘ length, with 
good substance,” to any other description. Tall horses answer 
very well to run over straight courses of short lengths, such as 
the one for the two thousand guineas’ stakes at Newmarket, 
and the Riddlesworth ; they also come in well enough for Epsom 
and Ascot; but for running under high weights—twelve stone 
in King’s plates—at long racing lengths, from two to four miles, 
or for running on a small cock-pit or whip-top sort of course, 
the low lengthy horse”—being, as he mostly is, a round goer, 
and comparatively bandy at his turns, is, in my estimation, by 
far the most likely. 
We shall not trouble our reader with any common-place detail 
about conformation, but sum up this chapter by forcibly im¬ 
pressing upon him the necessity, beyond all other considerations, 
of attending to such points as denote a sound constitution, and 
strong and fleet limbs; these being indispensables in the con¬ 
struction of a race-horse having any pretensions to superiority. 
However, as there is no such thing as perfection in a racer, any 
more than in any other living creature, due allowances must be 
made for faultiness. Our chief aim should be, to come as near 
to perfection as possible; and this we shall be best enabled to 
put in practice, by making a sort of debtor and creditor account 
between the bad points and the good ones. If we find the latter 
counterbalance the former, and that the horse possesses action, 
and, above all, evinces this in his walk, and is withal sound, let 
nothing but an out-of-the-way price hinder us from purchasing 
him. 
In the second chapter, Mr. Darvill makes some proper and 
manifest distinctions between the thorough-bred, half-bred, and 
cock-tail, and at the same time points out wdiat use should be 
made of these differences in running one description of horse 
against the other. 
The reason why thorough-bred horses so far surpass half- 
bred ones is, not from the circumstance of their beinij thorough- 
bred, but because they are bred to race.’’ Now, though this may 
appear, at first view, somewhat paradoxical, we believe, on close 
examination, it will turn out to be pithily, nay, happily expressed. 
What constitutes the difference between the Arabian—the foun¬ 
tain of all our blood and our present breed of blood-horses ? If 
not that the one is of pure genuine blood, or thorough-bred,” 
while the other is “ bred to race ?” To what a degree has the 
altered system pursued in racing changed our breed of racers? 
Have they not degenerated from the sterling King’s plate horse 
