The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1876-02-01
THE FARM AND HOUSEHOLD.
Breeding I'm and I'm.

The subject of in-and-in breeding has &C.
cuped the attention of some of the ablest
breeders and profoundest thinkers engaged
in rural pursuits. Many eminent breeders
have illustrated the genealogy of the animal
race by adopting the practice of in-and-in
breeding-avoiding incestuous connections
with ali occasional out.cross to prevent the
degenerating effects of consanguinity. How
far breeding into relatives can be carried
without degenerating is subject to be deter
mined by its practical effects. All breeders
are more or less connected by blood. The
thoroughbred is closer inbred than any 9TH
err class. He is priced higher because no
strange blood has been suffered to pollute his
escutcheon. Breeding twice in, and once
out, gives strong form or fixed type to the
breed that they will be likely to transmit as
family inheritance. Breeding to relatives in
the second degree does not appear to degen-
crate the breed. Some of our most famous
stock horses have been bred to cousins and
kindred through sire and dam to some favor
lite stallion that has given them character and
patronage till they have scattered their stock
broadcast over the land.
Rysdyk's Hambletonian has no less than
four collateral lines, through sire and dam,
running back to Messenger. Two crosses
through bis sire, Abdallah, and two more in
bred strains through the grandam, One Eye,
by Hambletonian, son of Messenger. Lady
Suffolk, one of the best trotting mares that
ever appeared, in public, had three crosses to
Messenger, reaching that great progenitor
from the third and fourth generations.
Dutchman, the great three-mile champion,
had two strains to Messenger, only three re-
moves from that fountain-head of trotters.
General Knox, one of the best stock horses
in this country, has four strains running
back to Messenger, through sire and dam,
two through his dam and grandam, by Har
ris' Hambletonian, who was by Bishops
Hambletonian, out of a dam by imp. Mes
senger, and two through Vermont Hero,
whose dam and grandam were by HANDLE
tonian or his son. Goldsmith Maid was in
bred to Old Abdallah. She was sired by
Alexander's Abdallah, a grandson of Old Alb
dallah, out of mare by Abdallah. giving her
a double cross. to that famous stallion. She
is incomparably the superior of any horse of
modern times, and stands the peerless Queen
of the trotting course. She has trotted three
heats in 2:20.or better, in thirteen different
starts, a feat unexampled in the history of
trotting. She will probably close her racing
career with the present season, and will go
from the turf in the triumph of victory, COM
polling her feetest aspirants to trail in her
dust. She leaves an enduring record that
stands out In bold defiance to all her success
sors.
Most Of the trotters have come down from
a few choice mares united with superior stall
lions. The mare that has bred one trotter
will breed another to the same horse, under
the same favorable circumstances. Old Kate,
the dam of Bruno and Brunette, who trotted
together in double harness in 2:254, has bred
ten colts to Hambletonian and two or three
to other stations. All that were ever trained
have trotted low down in the twenties. The
produce of this mare must have realized to
her owners, for colts sold, nearly $4,000.
They have passed through several hands,
and probably now represent in the names OF
their present owners a capital cost of over
$4,000. -
We ought to profit by these examples.
The same causes produce similar effects. The
dam of Old Kate was a PAGER, very good ell
ement in the blood of trotters. She took
kindly to trotting, became fast and was a
slayer on the road. Uniting this mare, gift
ed with perfect action, to Hambletonian, a
natural trotter, there were no extremes to
overcome. Consequently they matched, and
their colts came out with the natural, easy
stroke, and training made them fast. Hered-
itary law controls the destiny of colts it is as
fixed and immutable as the motion of the
heavenly bodies. All are after their kind, is
an axiom as old as the art of breeding. Great
speed is the reproduction of superior action
that is hereditary in the blood. Trotting in
stinct is the will to put the body in motion.
The will power is indispensable to the per-
Torrance of great tasks. 1t must be bred in
the machine in motion. When we get the
will to put in force the physical power we
may expect continued exertion and great
endurance ichS0nn FnyYner