Part 3 (2/2)
Nevertheless on a subsequent page we find recorded a very striking example of endurance, which compares favourably with any of those quoted in the foregoing pages and in my little work on Ponies:[6]
[6] ”Ponies: Past and Present.” By Sir Walter Gilbey, Bart Vinton & Co., Ltd.
”The late Mr. Allen of Sudbury, in Suffolk, often during the course of his life rode from that place to London and back (112 miles) in the course of a day upon a pony. This task was performed by several which Mr. Allen had in succession. When he returned home from these expeditions he was in the habit of turning the little animal he had ridden at once into the lanes without giving it a grain of corn. Mr. Allen, whose weight was very light, rode at a smart canter. He always selected Welsh ponies, saying that no others were so stout.”
The author adds that if any one of our enlarged horses could be found capable of performing this task it would certainly not be on a gra.s.s diet; which is undoubtedly true.
At the date this book was published, 1836, the deterioration which our race horses had undergone through the abolition of long-distance races was a subject of comment. The author deplores the altered conditions of the Royal Plates and the feebleness of the horses bred only for speed, on the ground that the change was producing ill effects upon all saddle-horses.
The author puts the whole case for a changed method of breeding in a nutsh.e.l.l when he writes that ”we want a cla.s.s of horses bred under a system which holds the balance even between speed, stoutness and structural power.” As proving that the balance can be struck, he points to the uniformity of speed and stoutness which distinguishes a good pack of foxhounds. None are markedly faster than the others; the aim is to get the hounds as even in all respects as possible, and there are numerous packs which prove to us that this aim can be achieved with wonderful completeness. It goes without saying, however, that it is infinitely easier to build up a level pack of hounds than it would be to develop a given number of horses all of which shall be alike!
It is exceedingly interesting to find that sixty-four years ago this author, with the improvement of horses in view, should advocate adoption of the step which has been urged in the chapter (p. 36 and _seq._) on ”Breeding Small Horses.” He is in favour of a National Establishment or breeding stud, but that is a detail; he explains that his only reason for making it a Government department is to secure that continuity of policy which is otherwise unattainable. The nucleus of his scheme is to ”obtain from the East a considerable number of well selected ponies. The better portion would be found to possess much natural speed, stoutness under severe exertion, with limbs and feet peculiarly adapted for moving rapidly on a hard surface.” The persons commissioned to buy these ponies
”Would search in vain for these properties which are acquired under a system of continued selection. Looking only for natural qualities, they should select animals as nearly in a state of nature as they could find them; having good symmetry, a full amount of muscle and whatever natural speed the best animals of the best race are found to possess.”
He would have these horses tested for speed when brought home, the standard being a natural degree of speed and not that of the Turf.
”The offspring of these small horses should be tried in each succeeding generation; and we should be satisfied for a few years to see the natural speed of the race gradually augment, retaining only for breeding such as went through their trials satisfactorily.”
On a later page he suggests the propriety of crossing these Eastern sires with our Forest and Moorland ponies. He cannot doubt that the immediate offspring of the first cross will prove suitable for the saddle:
”The best saddle horses we possess being now occasionally produced by crossing the race horse with a pony mare. This experiment often succeeding with one of the parents so ill fitted for taking part in it as the modern racer, there is every reason to conclude that, with parents properly const.i.tuted on both sides, the breeding of the best cla.s.s of saddle horses might be accompanied with little uncertainty.”
Thus far we find that the suggestions for breeding small horses set out on pp. 36-43 were antic.i.p.ated over sixty years ago. We must, before taking leave of the author, glance at his plan for ”renovating” our half wild breeds of ponies. If it were practicable to carry out the experiment he outlines, the results would be of undoubted interest.
”To experiment properly in this matter it is necessary that a public establishment should appropriate some extensive district of unreclaimed and bad pasturage to the maintenance of a large body of ponies. These should be interfered with only to the extent of severe selection, founded on annual trials; taking the animals for this purpose from their pasturage for a few days during the summer, and tying them to pickets. Here they should be closely inspected, and after the best formed had been selected from the rest, they should be taken ten or twenty at a time by rough riders of light weight, and submitted to a trial of some hours' duration. The animals which went through this satisfactorily should be divided into two portions: one should be returned to their old pasturage to remain at their then stature; while the other portion should be made to occupy a somewhat better pasturage in order that their offspring might acquire greater stature, the rest to be drafted and sold. When old enough the enlarged stock should be tried, and such as went through it well should be kept, and turned out into a little better pasturage than that in which they had been reared, while those rejected should be drafted and sold. It is only in this very gradual manner that the stature of a race can be increased to the point required. Ponies of a pure race being so vigorous as to be wholly unfitted for rich pasturage, they become upon it b.a.l.l.s of fat. None of our native ponies under the plan now proposed would be enlarged or withdrawn from their miserable pasturage unless their form and action were good; the only change then effected would be a pasturage a little better. Any further enlargement would be made to depend upon the manner in which they had been found to bear the preceding one.”
His plan has at all events the great merit that it proposes to seek the limit of enlargement in the half-wild ponies without risking loss of hardiness and other valuable qualities by pampering.
WORKS BY SIR WALTER GILBEY, BART.
Animal Painters of England from the year 1650. Ill.u.s.trated. Two vols., quarto, cloth gilt, Two Guineas net on subscription. Prospectus free.
The Great Horse or War Horse From the Roman Invasion till its development into the s.h.i.+re Horse. New and Revised Edition, 1899. Seventeen Ill.u.s.trations.
Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s.
Harness Horses The scarcity of Carriage Horses and how to breed them. 3rd Edition. Twenty-one Chapters. Seven full-page Ill.u.s.trations.
Octavo, cloth gilt, 2s.
Young Race Horses--suggestions for rearing, feeding and treatment. Twenty-two Chapters. With Frontispiece and Diagrams. Octavo, cloth gilt, price 2s.
Life of George Stubbs, R.A.
Ten Chapters. Twenty-six Ill.u.s.trations and Headpieces. Quarto, whole Morocco, gilt, price 3 3s.
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