These prices are quite exceptional. However, I think that this crisis is less felt here than with us. Horses were shown to me that had been sold for 90_l._ or 100_l._ which would certainly not have fetched the same money at the last fair at Guibray; but on an average the carriage horses are not at all better than those we see in the Normandy markets. On the other hand, saddle horses are certainly superior and are yet sold very cheaply. Mr. Thompson took me to see a lady, who showed us a very handsome little mare, five years old, a wonderful jumper, beautifully groomed, which had been just brought back from the fair unsold, although only 45_l._ were asked for her. How small the world is! We entered the lady’s house quite accidentally, and after five minutes’ conversation we discovered that we had already met twenty years before, when she was quite a little girl and I was a middy. Our meeting had taken place at Siam. Every one confirms what I already suspected, that horse-breeding is in its decadence here as well as in England. Formerly the English were greatly in advance of us in rearing carriage horses. Now they have nothing equal to our Anglo-Norman horse, and of this I have just received a most convincing proof. The Americans are now endeavouring to create a race of carriage horses in their country, that are to be elegant and yet a little taller and stouter than their present breeds. They come to Caen to purchase their studs. A train of thirty-five was sent over from there quite recently. If they had formed the same wish thirty or forty years ago, they would not for one instant have dreamed of seeking the horses they required from us. Why have we remained behind England for so long? In order to have good horses we must have good pastures, a good climate, and above all the assurance of a remunerative sale. Now, our pasturage is quite equal to theirs, and our climate is infinitely better; if then our breeders could not compete with theirs it is only because they did not obtain a sufficiently high price for their productions. I have a very clever friend with whom I have often talked over this subject, and who clearly explains why English horse raising is so much more flourishing than our own. He asserts that we have no reason to blush for this retrospective inferiority, and that, on the contrary, we may feel proud of it, for it proceeded from a purely moral cause. The superiority of English horse-breeding was, according to him, entirely due to the extraordinary way in which the English manage their love affairs. Every one knows that, during the whole of the last and even during the early part of the present century, English ladies were extremely frivolous. In France, when a marquise selected a lover, it never occurred to them that it was necessary to scour the high roads together in order to assure each other of their affection. On the contrary, when an Englishwoman felt that she could not offer a prolonged resistance to