A Dissertation on Horses | Page 3

their parts, without making any appeal to blood.
Allow but a difference in the texture, elegance, and symmetry of parts
in different Horses, whose extraction is foreign, this principle will be
clearly proved, and the word HIGH- BRED is of no use, but to puzzle
and lead us astray: and every man's daily observation would teach him,
if he was not lost in this imaginary error, particular blood, that,
generally speaking, such Horses who have the finest texture, elegance
of shape, and the most proportion, are the best racers, let their blood be
of what kind it will, always supposing it to be totally foreign. If I was
asked what beauty was, I should say proportion: if I was asked what
strength was, I should say proportion also: but I would not be
understood to mean, that this strength and beauty alone will constitute a
racer, for we shall find a proper length also will be wanted for the sake
of velocity; and that moreover the very constituent parts of foreign
Horses differ as much from all others, as their performances. But this,
however, will be found a truth; that in all Horses of every kind, whether
designed to draw or ride, this principle of proportion will determine the
principle of goodness; at least to that part of it which we call bottom.
On the other hand, our daily observation will shew us, that no weak,
loose, disproportioned Horse, let his blood be what it will, ever yet was

a prime racer. If it be objected, that many a plain ugly Horse has been a
good racer; I answer that all goodness is comparative; and that such
Horses who have been winners of plates about the country, may be
improperly called good racers, when compared to some others: but I
can even allow a very plain Horse to be a prime racer, without giving
up the least part of this system: for instance if we suppose a Horse
(with a large head and long ears, like the Godolphin Arabian) a low
mean forehand, slat sided, and goose rumped, this, I guess, will be
allowed a plain ugly Horse; but yet if such a Horse be strong, and justly
made in those parts which are immediately conducive to action; if his
shoulders incline well backwards, his legs and joints in proportion, his
carcase strong and deep, his thighs well let down, we shall find he may
be a very good racer, even when tried by the principles of mechanics,
without appealing to his blood for any part of his goodness. We are
taught by this doctrine of mechanics, that the power applied to any
body, must be adequate to the weight of that body, otherwise, such
power will be deficient for the action we require; and there is no man
but knows a cable or chord of three inches diameter is not equal in
strength to a chord of four inches diameter. So that if it should be asked
why a handsome coach Horse, with as much beauty, length, and
proportion as a foreign Horse, will not act with the same velocity and
perseverance, nothing will be more easily answered, without appealing
to blood; because we shall find the powers of acting in a foreign Horse
much more prevalent, and more equal to the weight of his body, than
the powers of acting in a coach Horse: for whoever has been curious
enough to examine the mechanism of different Horses by dissection,
will find the tendon of the leg in a foreign Hose is much larger than in
any other Horse, whose leg is of the same dimensions; and as the
external texture of a foreign Horse is much finer than of any other, so
the foreign Horse must necessarily have the greatest strength and
perseverance in acting, because the muscular power of two Horses
(whose dimensions are the same) will be the greatest in that Horse,
whose texture is the finest.
Let us next inquire what information we can gather from the science of
Anatomy, concerning the laws of motion: it teaches us, that the force
and power of a muscle consists in the number of fibres of which it is
composed; and that the velocity and motion of a muscle consists in the

length and extent of its fibres. Let us compare this doctrine with the
language of the jockey: he tells us, if a Horse has not length, he will be
slow; and if made to slender, he will not be able to bring his weight
through. Does not the observation of the jockey exactly correspond
with this doctrine? If we now inquire into the motion of Horses, we
shall find the bones are the levers of the body, and the tendons and
muscles (which are one and the same