Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 43, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 July 1875 — The Color of Horses. [ARTICLE]

The Color of Horses.

A writer in the London Field thus discourses of color in horses, speculating as to its trustworthiness as an indication of quality : “ The most prevailing color in England is certainly bay; why this arises I am unable to say. We must therefore believe that the best horses are bays without proof. Some time after the Peninsula war it was customary to have the troops of a cavalry regiment in colors; but the bay troops so far exceeded all the other troops, and such difficulty existed in supplying the other troops, that the distinctive colors of troops were abolished throughout the army, and only two regiments, the Queen’s Bays and the Scotch Grays, were allowed to retain a distinctive color. It was attempted to retain the Seventh Dragoon Guards as the ‘ Black Horse,’ but that utterly failed. Since then, in the days of the Crimean war, we have had the gray and chestnut troops of horse artillery. Ido not allude to the black troopers of the household regiments, as they are so well known to the world at large, and are bred chiefly in Lincolnshire especially for the purpose. The French are very fond of bays, but then they must not have a single white hair. The Cleveland bays are well known. They supplied the whole of the carriage horses of the nobility and leading gentry of the last generation. They were slow, tall, but carried themselves well. The dams were the carthorses of Cleveland, a portion of North Yorkshire, and were crossed with the thoroughbred. If the produce was heavy, after the dam, it reverted to her state m the plow; if it took after the sire, it was promoted to the hunting-field, where they were wonderful ‘loopers.’ The intermediate stage made the carriage horse. The breed is now totally extinct. The late Emperor of the French had a great fancy for these Cleveland bays, and finally drained the district of the few left. The chestnut is the favorite color of the Arabs. It is much liked by the Irish, and of course we all remember the best horse on record (Eclipse) was a chestnut; but it must be allowed that chestnuts are more subject to infirmities of temper and constitution, especially in regard to their eyes, than bays. The grays are generally underbsed. ‘ Ces terrible a gris ,’ as Napoleon caltajjU£em t however- did good service at Waterloo. Ido not remember a gray ever winning the Derby or a * big race;’nor did I ever see a good English gray in the hunting-field, though, singular to say, some of the best hunters in Ireland have been grays. Grays do fairly in harness, and I consider a chestnut and a gray the prettiest match of any. To blacks there are the same objections as to chestnuts —infirmity of temper and constitution. They are more liable to contracted feet and navicular than other colors, and the most vicious horse I ever saw was a black, and that was in the army. They are generally underbred, for I never remember seeing a black race-horse. Pray do not confound blacks with black-browns, of which latter color was old Voltigeur; and there is a stallion now in Tipperary, Blue Peter, getting some of the finest hunting stock leversaw. Blacks are very good for agricultural purposes, and on all the large farms nowadays in Yorkshire and Lincolnshire black horses are alone used. My favorite color is dap-£le-brown —such a color as the Plying Dutchman was, and old McOrville, who got the best hunters in England, and Slinge, who did a like good office for ‘ ould Ireland.’ In Dresden I saw some beautiful dapple-browns, short-legged, with good action, -admirably adapted for mail phaetons. They had also some splendid chestnut cart-horses, with no hair about their legs. There is a studfarm at Mauriceberg, six miles from Dresden. Composite-colored horses, as piebalds, black and white, skewbalds, chestnut and white, and graybalds (two shades of gray) are always soft horses, and only fit for Lady Scatter-carts or retired theatrical ladies; nevevertheless, I remember one skewbald cob, a good-bottomed nag and a good fencer; and in Connemara you may meet with duns, good animals over an intricate country. Composite colors are ‘ loud,’ and consequently vulgar. Let us taboo them from our category.” The editor of the Field adds: “Gustavus (gray) won the Derby in 1821, and Chanticleer was a good race-horse; we have only to point to Grimaldi and Peter Simple, in the early days of steeple-chas-ing, as magnificent hunters of that color; also to Saunterer as a first-class black race-horse.”

To this may be added the fact that roan horses, and horses of any dark color with an admixture of white in their coats, are highly valued by some horsemen for supposed qualities of endurance. The story, too, of the Arab Sheik may be quoted, who, when he was pursued by mounted enemies, asked his keenersighted son what was the color of their horses. In the first instance it was black, and the Sheik was confident of escaping them. Having left these behind another band appeared with white horses, which, in their turn, gave the Sheik no concern. But when a band mounted on chestnut horses gave chase he said: “ None but Allah can save us from chestnut horses.” What was the color of the Sheik’s steeds or what was the success of the chestnut pursuers we do not remember, or never heard. The result of the whole matter seems to be that color is never a sure indication either of value or worthlessness. A silled judge of horses, no doubt, may be governed more or less by color in reaching his conclusions, but, given good points, sound lungs and good appetite, it is not probable that he will, on general principles, give preference either to white, black or any of the intermediate shadea.— Ckriitis* Unign.