railroads, have indeed small occasion to prove the lasting qualities of our horses. The covert-hack of the present day is the animal that is required to prove his superiority to his stable companions, for he _may_ be asked, by a master who likes to get his beauty-sleep after eight A.M., to do his fifteen miles, with as many stone on his back, in five minutes over the hour; and this is exceedingly good going. Still, a summer’s day’s journey of eighty or ninety miles, with only one stoppage to bait for an hour or two, such as used to be frequently accomplished by jockeys and other locomotive individuals on the old-fashioned hackney of the last century, was a very different matter, and required in the performer not only perfect soundness of limbs and constitution, but a very true and even style of going, that gave every point and articulation fair play, and no excess of work above its due share. Such a fault in a horse as _hitting his legs_ of course would have rendered him utterly useless before two-thirds of his task was accomplished. It is feared that we shall lose altogether the breed of animal that is capable of such performances. For many years we have been studying to acquire increased _power_, and consequently _pace_, to the disregard of _stamina_. It stands to reason that the _larger_ a horse is, _cæteris paribus_, the _faster_ he can go; but it does not the least follow that his size should enable him to _go on_. Doubtless the object for which we get into the saddle is _dispatch_, and “the slows” is the worst disease our horse can be troubled with; nevertheless, there is a good old rule in mechanics which affirms “_nil violentum est perpetuum_;” and if your engine is to go with the weight and _momentum_ of an express train, you must calculate on a considerable expenditure of fuel, and great wear and tear on the nuts, screws, and fittings of the whole. Now, Nature, although the neatest and most finished of workers, will not submit herself to the laws of commensuration. She will not make you a model in _inches_, and supply you with a work on a corresponding scale in _feet_. It would seem as if she only issued a certain amount of stores in the aggregate, and if you are to get more iron, she gives you less steel; you shall have plenty of coke, but in return she stints you in oil. So, if the living creature she turns out for you on your estimate is to be very magnificent in its proportions, the chances are that it will either fail in activity, or be deficient in endurance.