saddle the only rapid and agreeable, and by far the most certain mode of travel, these beautiful and excellent little animals were preserved in their purity, were carefully propagated from the best mares and stallions of their own race, and commanded large prices for the use both of gentlemen and ladies, as road hackneys. Their power of carrying weight, and of travelling at an easy and moderate gait for an almost unlimited number of consecutive hours, was really wonderful. But when the progress of improvement covered England and her provinces with a network of excellent roads, it became unnecessary to keep up a particular breed of horses, too small for agricultural use, too light for draft, without sufficient speed or length for hunters, and from which no class of horses for general utility could be raised by any system of cross-breeding. Consequently the beautiful and enduring little Galloways fell gradually into disrepute, and were either not bred at all, or merely bred for fancy purposes. In Galloway, the breed is now entirely extinct; although of late years attempts have been made to produce its counterpart by breeding large-sized pony mares of the Scotch and Shetland breeds to small, low-built, close-coupled, bony, thorough-bred stallions, for the purpose of becoming children's riding horses and boys' hunters.
In Galway, the existence of the animal was not known until a comparatively recent period; and, as in that wild, remote and semi-civilized district, the same reasons still exist which originally caused them to be prized so highly in the sister kingdom,—the want of good roads for wheeled carriages,—they are believed still to exist there in their purity; although the rudeness of the district an the extremed poverty of the farmers have led to their deterioration. It is not, however, to be doubted, that if an intelligent system were adopted, the Galway-Galloways might be bred up to their original high standard.
