Edited by JOHN GILMER SPEED 
The purpose of this department is to give advice to those who have country or suburban places as to the purchase, keep 
and treatment of horses, cows, dogs, poultry, etc. Careful attention will be given each inquiry, the letter and answer 
being published in due time for the benefit of other readers. Where an early reply is desired if a self-addressed, stamped 
envelope is enclosed the answer will be sent. No charge is made for advice given. 
Arabs and Barbs 
I NEVER go into print on the subject of Arab 
horses without the knowledge that I will draw 
upon myself a whole lot of' undeserved criticism. 
When I say that the Arab horse is the basic stock 
from which all safely reproducing equine types have 
come, I am sure to be misunderstood by some 
quarrelsome or cranky fellow wbo chooses to construe 
what I modestly say, into an assertion that the Arab is 
the only type that is in the least worth while. I have 
never said that, and I never expect to say such a 
foolish thing. If racing be worth while the thorough¬ 
bred is worth while and though the thoroughbred is 
directly descended from the Arab and the Barb 
and other Ori¬ 
ental strains 
he can run all 
around the 
Arab, because 
he has been 
developed for 
speed. If we 
wish only 
heavy horses 
for draft pur¬ 
poses the Per- 
cherons of 
France are not 
to be excelled. 
They are also 
of Arab origin. 
And what is 
. more, all of the 
fixed types between the English thoroughbred at 
one end of the line and the French Percheron 
at the other extreme are Arabs, and to keep 
them up to the mark, I believe collateral strains 
of Arab blood should be commingled with them. 
The governmental breeding experts in France, 
Germany, Austria and Russia recognize this neces¬ 
sity. But in America, the greatest horse producing 
country, the very name of Arab is anathema. 
Men who never read ten books, including novels, 
and who never got five hundred miles away from the 
place of their nativity will tell us all about horse 
breeding and the various types of the world. What 
do they know 
Old Bill Rys- 
dyk, a hired 
man on Drover 
Seeley’s farm 
in Orange 
county. New 
York, in trying 
to write a name 
for Abdallah’s 
son wrote Ham- 
bletonian in the 
effort to achieve 
Hamiltonian. 
And of such 
are most of 
the rest of 
the m. The 
promoter of the 
“ METEOR MORGAN ” AND “ ROY MORGAN ” 
Owned by H. P. Crane, Wild Rose Farm, St. Charles, Ill. 
179 
