For draught purposes there have been a great many foreign horses brought here, and they have served an excellent purpose. I suspect indeed that if we had a record of the Percherons, Clydesdales, and Shire horse that have been brought into America for the purpose of breeding heavy horses for trucking, that the number would exceed the Thoroughbreds that have been imported for the improvement of that special type. We had no heavy horses of our own, and as there was a constant demand for draught horses it was inevitable that breeders should go for stock where that stock had been brought to the highest perfection. To us it seemed that the French horses, the Percherons,[9] were best adapted for our use. And though many have been brought here, it is not likely that the generality of Americans know the pure bred Percherons. But all of us are familiar with Rosa Bonheur’s “Horse Fair.” The models of the horses in this stirring and beautiful picture were Percherons, and nearly all of them stallions. The French, and other Latins besides, have a fondness for using stallions in ordinary work, and any day in Paris a visitor may see a long string of Percheron stallions drawing a heavy load as placidly as geldings would do it. There is no reason why stallions should not be used more generally in this country. The prejudice against their use as saddle- and harness-horses no doubt arose when the business of a greater part of the country was transacted by travelers who needed to hitch their horses where other horses were also tethered. But in work where a groom or driver is always in charge of a horse the stallion may be used with much advantage to himself and satisfaction to his owner. Footnote 9: Mr. Walters of Baltimore, began importing Percherons to America in 1866 and kept it up for twenty years. He translated the work of M. du Hays on the Percheron and illustrated it with photographs of horses and mares of his own importation. It is one of the handsomest horse books ever published.