Abdallah begot Almont. The pedigree in the breeder's catalogue, however, follows back his dam and granddam in the same way, the first tracing through the divergent stream of Mambrino Paymaster to the Darley Arabian also, and the second through Alexander's Pilot, Jun., and imported Diomed to the Godolphin Arabian. It traces also each male factor to his first, second, and third dam, and sets down his famous progeny and his time, so that the whole occupies two closely printed duodecimo pages. The stallion Aberdeen is a son of Rysdyk's Hambletonian by the Star mare Widow Machree. The Widow was one of the gamest mares that ever lived. She would go in any condition of health, and in her greatest race had to be helped to her feet, and "could scarcely put one foot before the other" when she first came on the track. Happy Medium is another son of Rysdyk's. Hambletonian, by Princess, the great rival of Flora Temple. Ethan Allen, Jun., represents the hardy Morgan family. Cassius M. Clay, Jun., lately dead, introduced into the Fairlawn stud the blood of the Clay family, descended from imported Grand Bashaw, a barb presented by the Bey of Tunis to President Jefferson. It is a strain rather weak and faint-hearted by itself, apt to give out before the mile is over, but of great value in combination with others. The varieties mentioned sum up most of the favorite strains known to the breeder's art. All these names, periods, families, and records, together with the other paraphernalia with which the professed horseman delights to surround himself, are something of a chaos at first to the beginner. By a little pains, however, the mystery may be dispelled, and at the same time the theory of breeding upon which the leading blue-grass residents are mainly agreed in their practice may be arrived at. A horse must have made a mile in 2 minutes and 40 seconds to find admission to that Burke's Peerage of the race, the American Trotting Register. The Kentucky breeders have reduced this in their register to 2.30. Certain blood-relatives of these favored ones are also ennobled by their performances, and find a place. There are no more than ninety-nine of or below 2.20, though perhaps some fifteen hundred of or below 2.30. This simplifies the number of those important enough to be specially looked after, and it will be seen that all descend from a few leading sources. Where names are reduplicated the name of the owner of each is attached-as Rysdyk's Hambletonian, Bishop's Hambletonian, Vermont Hambletonian-to prevent confusion. horses in the world which have records ants as well. He was the progenitor of the most remarkable family of trotters the world has ever seen. To descend from Messenger, for a horse, is a good deal like having come over with the Conqueror, or landed with the Pilgrims at Plymouth Rock. But with animals as with men, great powers are transmitted only along certain lines and to a limited few. Although he left after him more than a thousand children, and these a myriad of others, but a very small number continued his dynasty and became centres of power themselves. His son Bush Messenger propagated his blood in Maine; his grandson Hambletonian, in Vermont; his son Mambrino, two best grandsons, Rysdyk's Hambletonian and Mambrino Chief, and some few others in New York and the Central States, and later in Kentucky and the South. About all the trotting stock extant traces to some five families, based originally on the English thorough-bred, or running, stock. They are not at all of equal size; some are of a very minor sort; and by far the most prominent is that outlined in the descent of Almont, through imported Messenger. The Darley Arabian, the Godolphin Arabian-whom Eugène Sue has celebrated in his romance as 66 the King of the Winds"-and one or two oth- Trotting, it is well known, is of recent ers were brought over from Arabia in the date as compared with the running gait. early eighteenth century to improve the The thorough-bred running horse has alcommon stock of England. From them most innumerable crosses to his coat of chiefly has been developed the whole arms, while the highest-bred trotter can English race of thorough-breds. The pro- not possibly at present show more than duct is larger, stronger, swifter, and in six. Some few enthusiasts all along, from most respects an improvement on his an- the time of Messenger down, we may supcestry; but in the process he has lost the pose, met together and celebrated this gentleness, the almost human intelligence, amusement. Hiram Woodruff, the vetof the Arabian, and become overbearing eran trainer, who was a large part of and surly in temper. As original aristoc- what he describes, has given us a book racy derives from the Arabians, it would of memoirs, full of the rattle of hoofs and seem to be an easy matter to keep up the genial horse talk, which make it interimportations, and thus maintain the stand-esting reading. The period it covers, up ard of form and temper at any pitch re- to about 1860, may be called the last part quired. This has in fact been tried, and of the dark age of the art. The trotters hundreds more of the horses of the East | were ridden under saddle when he began. imported into the country since those The participants in the sport were rather times, but hardly ever with success. The looked askance at, but perhaps enjoyed it belief went out, therefore, that the Arabi- only the more for their partial proscription. ans had degenerated, which was strength- Now a vast interest has grown up, and ened by the fact of English horses having while the runner still remains an exotic, beaten some of those of the Khedive in the trotter is recognized as so essentially Egypt; but a Mr. Keene Richards, who American a product that he might almost imported Arabians into Kentucky, and be engraved on the national shield. A whose story is an interesting one, main- national association has been formed, with tained that the failure was due to not hav- head-quarters at Hartford, Connecticut, ing secured horses of the best sort; and which holds congresses and courts of arbihe adduced reasons to show the excessive tration, and has supervision of some one difficulty of doing it, even with the best hundred and eighty tracks throughout the intentions. country, and these represent property to the value of $200,000,000. The latest phase of the subject is the withdrawing of the best horses from the racing arena entirely by gentlemen of means, who reserve them for their own driving. However that may be, the English thorough-bred Messenger was brought to America before 1790. Though a runner by nature, he proved to be exceptionally strong in the trotting action, and to have the power to transmit it to his descend The general situation being as described, John W. Hunt, toward forty years ago, brought out to Kentucky Commodore and Old Abdallah, grandsons of Messenger. They were not greatly appreciated just then, and were taken back. The list of horses mentioned in connection with the older Lexington track shortly followed, but it was not until Mambrino Chief was brought out in 1854, and Alexander's Abdallah in 1858, that the movement in the blue-grass region, which has had such notable results, really began. Mambrino Chief, sire, among others, of Lady Thorne, proved a prolific sire of mothers of trotters. He left after him in the direct male line seventy-four trotters with records of 2.30 or better. Alexander's Abdallah, though starting later and happening on the disastrous times of the war-in which he finally perished of ill usage at the hands of guerrillas-left thirty-nine trotters with records of 2.30 or better, one being Goldsmith Maid, whose record is 2.14. In these two names is epitomized a history of equine greatness. It is found in all breeding that the best results are realized from uniting again divergent streams of kindred blood which have been separated for a certain time; and this brings us to the theory of raising the fast trotters at present in favor in Kentucky. "I take a list of all trotters which have ever made a record of 2.20 or better," says our host, the general, settling comfortably down to his demonstration, "and ascertain to what families they belong. This gives me at once the leading sources. I next trace the number of representatives in 2.30 or under belonging to each family, and find the test begun with the first experiment confirmed. Nearly all belong to a very few families, and as the speed test is increased, more and more belong to that of Rysdyk's Hambletonian. These are naturally the families to breed from, since if there is certainty anywhere, it is here, while outside, the domain of chance is too large.' Acting upon these principles, such a selection of stallions has been made, with Belmont at the head, as to include one from each of the main families. At the same time, in the large list of one hundred and twenty brood-mares an effort has been made to comprise some representative of every minor strain of blood as well which has ever accomplished anything of importance, in order to secure all the chances of happy combinations in crossing that are possible. "But there seem to be now, as there always have been," I offer by way of ar tioner of high rank in the veterinary art testifies that of two thousand trotters examined by him fully one-half were unsound. He holds that training for trot gument, "soldiers of fortune who owe their position to their own good exertions solely. Flora Temple was taken from the tail of a drover's wagon, Dutchman from a brick cart, Justin Morgan had no ances-ting predisposes to diseases, and that there tor that ever was known; and here in last year's list of winners are Joe Rhea, for instance, record 2.23, and Valley Boy, 2.244, opposite whom is set the notice, 'pedigree unknown.'" is more probability of finding some capital blemish in a trotter of great speed than in others. But we have not yet inquired the cause of Kentucky's superiority-why it is that the same pains expended here produce better results than elsewhere. It is ascribed, first, to the character of the pasturage ad "That is true, but there are fewer every year, and it is more probable that the pedigrees have disappeared-gone down, like some of our Kentucky streams, to re-verted to, and next to the existence in the appear elsewhere-than that they did not exist. If you will look at the head of last year's list you will see that the leaders are Clingstone, with a record of 2.14, and Jerome Eddy and Edwin Thorne, with 2.164 each, and that these, with most of the rest of the long list, are out of the highestbred trotting stock. It is but a short time, I know, since people have begun to be convinced that the trotter was not merely a happy accident, and could be bred at all; but look at the uniform improvement in the record since scientific breeding began: State of an exceptionally good class of common stock for the new experiments in breeding to be based upon. Kentucky was settled up by Virginians who brought their Cavalier taste for fox-hunting and running horses into the State with them. We hear of Washington and Jefferson running horses at Alexandria in the year 1790. Colonel John Hoomes and Colonel John Tayloe, of Virginia, brought over, immediately after the Revolution, some of the best English thorough-breds, the latter bringing Diomed, the first winner of the Derby. The descendants of these constituted a stock of warm blood," from which Richard Ten Broeck was enabled to derive horses to carry off the honors of the British turf between 1857 and 1867, and from which also have come Mr. Sanford's Preakness, winner of the Brighton cup in 1876, and later Mr. P. Lorillard's Iroquois, winner of the Derby and St. Leger, and Parole, winner at Newmarket and Epsom, and Mr. Keene's Foxhall, winner of the Ascot cup, the Grand Prize of Paris, and others. The thorough-bred blood has always been a resource to draw upon to give the trotter "game" and "staying" power. "And what is the limit of time at which It is a mooted question just how much you will finally arrive?" "Two minutes now is not more incredible than was two-twenty a quarter of a century ago," replies the general. This is an interesting problem to speculate about, as it is always interesting to approach final facts. Will the trotter go on improving indefinitely till he reaches, with his less natural gait, the time of the running horse, which yet stands, as made by Ten Broeck in 1877, at 1.39, or will the very perfecting of the machine destroy it at a fixed point, causing it to flame out, perhaps, in some splendid effort like a costly fire-work? A practi of it can be used without overcoming the trotting tendency which it is desirable to cultivate. Some few trotting sires, and notably Alexander's Pilot, Jun., have had the power to transmit to their progeny the proper gait even when crossed directly with a thorough-bred, but as a general thing this is dangerous. Many consider two trotting crosses upon a thorough-bred foundation the nearest to perfection that has been reached, and as this process has produced Maud S., bred on the neighboring Alexander estate, it has no mean argument in its favor. There are charming rural scenes on such a place as this at which we find ourselves, quite irrespective of the merit of the animals. Goubie's pleasing picture "La Visite aux Mères" will often be recalled. We too drive over to the distant pasture, and make our visit to the drove of brood-mares. Few would take them, running abroad in comfortable plebeian fashion in their woodland, for the valuable beings they are. Who would suppose yonder unkempt bay, round-barrelled and lazy, to be the dam of the tireless Piedmont, with his record of 2.174 in a fourth heat? The group gather round in a star- | ing meditative way, as if we should have had something more for them to eat. How naïvely they are governed by their appetites-the poor animals! Here is one with a wooden yoke about her neck-a jumper of fences, and a kicker of the rest at the feeding trough. Are you not ashamed to be seen in such insignia of disgrace, rogue? What! you take the pointed finger of scorn as an invitation, and come nosing too to see if there be not something for you in our pockets? Why, then, there is nothing for it but to go away ourselves. The groups of colts on the main place have a thousand poses and humors of graceful interest. Here is a delegation of the tender yearlings at a fence, looking over with shy boldness. The 1st of January is the common birthday of all of them, no matter when they were foaleda convenient practice in reckoning. They are of many sorts and sizes, "dish-faced" and Roman-nosed, white stars, silver manes and tails sparkling among them, big-stepping clumsy colts, and glib lowgoing fillies as feminine as girls of thirteen. At a word they are off like the birds in a sudden panic, or create one for themselves for the pure delight in the exercise. Again they are snuggling up against the golden ground of a clean straw stack as if they meant to push through it, or they are munch, munch, munching all together in a row at the long crib of one of their shelter sheds, provided for them to run into and out of freely as a change from the pastures. As to securing their likenesses by photography, they know perfectly well that the camera is designed to shoot them, and they will never submit to so dreadful a fate while it can be avoided by motion. They are distributed into separate paddocks, not more than a dozen or twenty in company. Those used to consort togeth er in this way form a kind of close corporation to which a stranger is only admitted with difficulty. They let fly their light heels at the new-comer, and give him a casual nip or so as he approaches the feeding trough, so that he stands disconsolately about for several days, till by a gradual assimilation he is finally received on equal terms. As the object in raising horses is to put bone and muscle upon them, and not, as with cattle, fat, they are encouraged to A chief curiosity here is the Arab mares, offspring of stock brought over in person by a gentleman of romantic history, Keene Richards, Esq., and claimed by him to be of the purest blood extant. The pedigree of one of them, to quote a typical part of it, declared him to be "a Kobeylan, the son of a Kobeylan, and his mother is a Kobeylan purer than milk. He was born and brought up in the land of Nejd. This is the genealogy of the said horse, as God is omnipotent." They are small, these Arabians, none of them standing over 15 hands high, and exhibit grace and intelligence rather than power. This group of three, two grays and a chestnut, are children of Fysaul, of the choice Sack-run about as much as possible, and made lowie race, and the mare Loulie, of the Kobeylan race, older yet. Are they reflecting still perhaps on the desert, the tents, the spears, the camels, and prayingcarpets from the midst of which their fathers were brought here to consort with Yankee mates? The Arabs have but lately passed into the hands of General Withers from their owner, who died impoverished. The results of crossing them with native breeds have not yet proved remarkable in any way. Local peculiarities have hampered the experiment, which may be more successful under better conditions. hardy by being kept out-of-doors all but a few days of the most exceptionally inclement weather. They are taken up from their mothers when weanlings, and put in a stall two together, supporting better in this way the novel experience. A man enters every day for a while, rubs and handles them gently, and familiarizes them with human society. Then they are halter-broke, and turned loose again, not to be taken up till they are well matured yearlings. By that time they have grown rather wild again, and the process is repeated. Harness-breaking is added im |