Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1877-12-22
thoroughbred Horses.

There exists in the grossest ignorance
as to what constitutes thoroughbred
horse. Nearly every agricultural society
in the land has class in its premium
list for thoroughbred horses; and yet
few of them have q definite idea as to
what is requisite to render horse eligi-
BILE in this class. Scores of cases are
referred to this Office each year, from
the managers of county, State and dis
trict societies, for decision as to eligi-
bility; and many of these are cases in
which a very slight knowledge of the
subject ought to enable the officers of
these societies to decide for themselves.
In the first place it should be under
stood that we derive the term, as well as
the breed of horses to which it applies,
from our British cousins across the
water. The term, when applied to
horses, is used to designate one particu-
lar breed, and that is the running horse.
In England this blood has been kept
pure since the reign of Charles H., with
out any admixture, save an occasional
fresh infusion of Oriental blood from
which it was originally fresh created;
and no horse is thoroughbred unless
his descent can be traced, in an un-
broken, unmixed current, to this ances-
try. Stud books were introduced at an
early date, and the pedigrees of
thoroughbred horses have long been
kept with the most scrupulous exact
ness, nothing being admitted to registry
that is contaminated with any outcross
however remote.
All our American thoroughbreds are,
therefore, imported from England, or
are descendants of animals so imported.
A recent cross with an imported Arab or
Barb, while it does not vitiate the blood
nor render an animal ineligible rs a
thoroughbred, is it not usually regarded
as desirable, from the fact that the
course of selection which has been prac-
ticed by the breeders of thoroughbred
horses in England and America, for the
last hundred years, has given us a race
that is generally considered to be far
superior to the Oriental horse of to-day
in speed, size and stoutness. The CON-
pliers of stud books for thoroughbred
horses in this country have relaxed the
English rule somewhat, and admit to
registry animals that show an unmixed
descent for five generations of pure
blood; and while, under this rule. many
animals may be admitted that are not,
in the strict sense of the word, thorough
bred, yet if for five generations nothing
but thoroughbred sires and dams are to
be found in the pedigree, The quantity OF
alien blood remaining must be inanitesi-
mally small; and by usage, the animal
SO bred is, in this country, ranked as q
thoroughbred.
If our agricultural societies would
bear in mind that none of our American
| trotters, no matter how long the pedi-
gree, and none of our imported or native
draft horses, are eligible 10 compete for
premiums. offered for thoroughbreds,
they would spare themselves much
trouble; and nine tenths of the money
spent for postage stamps in writing us
for information on this subject would be
saved. No pedigree that has Rysdyk's
Hambletonian, Abdallah, Morgan, Bell
founder, Hiatoga, Mambrino Chief,
Royal George, Patchen, or any other
of our prominent trotting sires in it, can
belong to thoroughbred. 1t may ap-
pear strange to some that it is necessary
for us to make this state ement yet we
have seen premiums awarded in the
thoroughbred class to trotting stations,
at both State and county fairs, quite
often; and we have known some cases
where imported draft horses have been
entered in this class, and were supposed
to be eligible. National Live Stock
Journal.