OLD WAR HORSES.

Taranaki Daily News, 4 December 1915, Page 9 (Supplement)

OLD WAR HORSES.

From Edward III.'? reign to that of Henry VIII. little is known of the development of the English horse. Henry VIII. imported horses from Turkey, Spain, and Naples, and he enacted laws for the improvement of the native horse. Each park owner had to keep from two to four brood mares not less than 13 hands high, and no stallions under 14 hands high were allowed for breeding in the common, chases, and forests, and 10 stallions under 15 hands were allowed to run free. The gelding was introduced about this time.

In Elizabeth's reign there was still a scarcity of horses, and tn 1588—the year of the Spanish Armada—only 3000 horses could be mustered, and these were said to have been strong, bulky animals, slow in action, and only fit for agriculture or draught, and very indifferent chargers. It was a penal offence at this time to make over a "horse to the use of any Scottish man." Coaches were also introduced, an invention which marks out a new stage in the history of the English horse.

Blunderville, writing in 1050 of what he considers the best breeds, includes the Turk and the Barbarian in his list, and says that the horses that "do commonly call Barbarians do come out of the King of Tunnisland, out of Massilie Numioia, which for the most be but little horses, but themselves very swift, and able to make a long cariere, which is the cause why we esteem them so much." These eastern horses soon produced their effect in improving the native horses, and in the middle of Charles Ist. reign there were considerable numbers of horses of the hunter type in England. It was on such horses that Cromwell managed to mount his Ironsides, at a cost of some £-20 for each horse. The great Protector knew his business well. There is a letter from him, dated November IJ, 1642, which must remain a model for the needs of the horse-soldier. It rims: —"Dear Friend.—Let the saddler see to the horse gear. I learn from one many are illserved. If a man has not good weapons, horse and harness, he is as naught. —From your Friend, Oliver Cromwell." ! Charles 11. was 'the true founder of the system of br|eding which produced the tlforoughbred horse of to-day. He sent his Master of Horse to the Levant to buy horses principally Turks and Bards. The influence of the Libyan horse must still be noticed. The result of these purchases was the celebrated relay mares, from which our racehorses are for the most part descended. I The great warhorse served his part and gradually disappeared his descendants still surviving in the cart horse, in the state coach horse, and in {lie black chargers of the Household Cavalry. As the need of swifter horses for war and for pleasure arose, so the modern types gradually developed, the racehorse and hunter deriving their size and strength from the old native strains, and their beauty, courage and endurance from the Eastern sires.—English Live Stock Journal.