The Frenchmen shrugged. The blacks, they explained, were preferred by certain coach drivers of the old days who didn’t want to be forever cleaning their horses. The grays were preferred by other drivers because they could be seen in the dark of night and were safer to drive. So Mark Dunham bought some of each, seven in all, and had them shipped to America.
Picture the excitement in the little village of Wayne when a freight train pulls into the station and down the runway come seven horses, weighing a ton apiece!
Mark Dunham is talking to them in French, trying to make them feel at home as he leads them cloppety-clop down the lane past the little red schoolhouse and cloppety-clop past the little white church. Later, he lined that very lane with elm trees, the same kind he remembered seeing in La Perche, and he planted alfalfa and clover and built red barns like the ones in France. Then he bought more and more Percherons, three and four hundred in some years, until Wayne became the Percheron center of the United States.
Today, the branches of the elm trees he planted meet overhead and interlace like the P and the S of the Percheron Society. Some of the big red barns are still standing, too. And the descendants of those Percherons are scattered over the United States and Canada. They are plowing, and hauling heavy loads, and trotting to wagon—the power animals of the farm.
Of course, not all are work horses. Some are dapply gray Rosin-backs, awaiting their cues in the back yard of the circus.
The Belgian
SOMETIMES BOTH A MAN AND a horse have a strong sense of determination, and when they put their mind and muscle to the same load, it moves!
Horse-pulling contests at county fairs are as old as kerosene lamps and, like the lamps, they often caused a good deal of smoke. Matched teams took turns pulling a boatlike sled loaded down with stones or sacks of sand. The team that could pull the boat the farthest in one straight pull was hailed champion.
But often such a contest ended in a fist-flying fight. A losing driver would complain that for his team the stoneboat was not set in the same path and the grass wasn’t so level as for the winning team. The crowd would split; some took sides with the loser and some rose loudly to the defense of the winner. The fight was on! And it recurred as regularly as harvest.
Finally, after many years of experimenting, a wondrous machine was designed, as different from a stoneboat as a jet plane is different from a kite. It is known as a dynamometer, and it has iron weights, like a scale, to register just how many pounds a team can pull. Now, no matter what the terrain—uphill or down, concrete road or cinder path—the resistance of the dynamometer is the same always.
This scientific measuring stick ended the fights of the pulling contests, and it did more. It told the farmer exactly how many pounds his team could pull, and this knowledge kept him from overloading them or making two trips when one would do. But the real and deep benefit was that it acted as a spur in improving the quality of the draft horse. In 1924 the world record was a pull of 3,100 pounds. Now the record set by a handsome pair of Belgians is 4,275 pounds.
Belgians are the big rugged horses that consistently set the heavyweight records. They “get right down and lay right to,” as the teamsters say. And so determined are the creatures that onlookers strain forward, tensing their own muscles, pulling as if they were yoked alongside the horses. The field has to be roped off to keep the people from rushing in, and even then they push against the ropes, struggling, straining, sweating with the teams. How they groan if their favorite team falls short of the goal! And how they whoop and holler when an extra pull sends the register past the two-ton figure!
The driver is not allowed to use his whip, nor even to slap the lines against the horses’ rumps. It is the coupling of man and horse that wins. Courage and strength on the part of the horse, coolness and steadiness on the part of the man.
While farmers once had to be wheedled and coaxed and almost pulled in by the ears to hook up their teams to a dynamometer, now as many as 125 pairs are entered in the national pulling contests. In the heavyweight division more Belgian teams compete than all other draft breeds.
Belgians have been asked to go on some strange pulling assignments. Both at the Hialeah race meetings in Miami and at Churchill Downs in Louisville the same four-horse team of Belgians pulls a big starting gate on and off the track. These horses are as beautiful and important in their way as the sleek race horses for whom they work. Shiny chestnut in color, with creamy white tails and manes, they are all pompous dignity. As the runners burst from the starting gate, the four Belgians quiver for just a moment as if they, too, would like to fly around the track. Then they lean into their traces and staunchly pull the gate away, justly proud of their own part in the show.
A study of the build of the Belgian will show why he is a weight puller. His body is compact with great muscular hindquarters to furnish propelling power. And his legs are so short that, when he doubles down into his harness, he seems part of the very earth, almost as if he drew his strength from the core of it. He does not pretend to have high action or an airy way of going; his forte is that strong sense of determination which makes a winner. Stolid, quiet, slow-moving he is, built for big tasks. A wagonload of corn stuck in the mire is a monster rooted until he digs into the earth with his toes and pulls and pulls. A tractor sometimes gives up. “And what’s more,” says one horseman, “tractors cannot multiply, either; they can only divide and fall to pieces.”
Today there are fewer work horses in the United States than there were ten and twenty years ago, but the percentage of Belgians has increased. Not all of them are purebred. Some are grade Belgians; that is, their sires were purebred and their dams were of unknown breeding. But so potent is the blood of the purebred that he stamps his own rugged characteristics on his colts.
What caused the Belgian horse to develop such power? Some think the humid soil which produced the rich grass of his native land helped to build his strong and heavy bones. Belgium is regarded as the homeground of the Great Horse of Flanders, and from him the present-day Belgian is descended. In the Middle Ages, both as war charger and field horse, he played an important role in life. The heavy soil that made him strong required a heavy horse to till it.
The preferred colors have always been chestnut, roan, or bay with flaxen manes and tails. Some of the horses, as they age, grow walrus-shaped mustaches which give them a grave and dignified air.
Although Belgians are a very old breed, they were not brought to the United States until 1885, but almost immediately they were in demand. Farmers discovered that at eighteen months a colt was ready for light work, such as pulling a sleighful of children to school. At two, he could be hitched to a plow, and by the time he was a four-year-old, when other draft breeds were just beginning to work, he was a seasoned veteran in the field.
Belgian owners have a fine appreciation of their breed. Perhaps it takes a man of strong determination to own a horse with the same will. Together, with mind and muscle, they can pull a load out of mud or a farm out of debt.
The Clydesdale
BRING IN YOUR HEAVY DRAFT geldings!” the ringmaster’s voice shrills out of the loud-speaker system. “Bring in your heavy draft geldings!”
A rustle of expectation ripples over the auditorium. The 4-H boys and girls stir in their seats, eyes darting from one entrance gate to the other.
Suddenly the ringmaster’s white gloved hands are raised like ivory batons, and the big drafters come thumping into the ring, each one led by a groom. Ten ponderous animals line up facing the rail, their rolled-up tails toward the center of the ring.
With a nod of his beaver hat the ringmaster tells the judge that all the entries are in. The two wide gates swing shut and there is a heavy pause while the lights stream down on the sleek royal entries, all festooned with rosettes and bows. Excitement mounts as boys and girls, farmers and stockmen lean forward in their squeaking seats, whispering numbers and names to one another.
And now the judge goes to work. With a quick swee
p of his eye he looks on the ten magnificent creatures, then points his cane to the one nearest. The groom begins walking the horse in a line straight away from the judge and back again, then trotting him away and back. The judge stops him, picks up a hoof, examines it for soundness, then sends the horse down to the far end of the class.
One after one each mighty animal is studied in action and at place. And now nine are lined up, and a Clydesdale stands alone. He is a handsome bay with flashy white markings, listed on the program as Ferguson’s Rob Roy. The judge signals him with his cane, and the groom, looking little and puny by comparison, walks the drafter straight away from the judge. Deliberately the Clydesdale lifts his feet well off the ground, planting his hind feet forward as decisively as his forefeet! The raising and bending action of his hock has the oiled ease of a piece of machinery. A patter of applause breaks out long before the judge is ready to name the winner.
“Reverse!” he barks to the groom. “Trot him back!”
The groom turns the Clydesdale about, and now comes the telling stroke of the trot. Up to the rail of the ring, back again to the center, working both ways, the Clydesdale demonstrates his ground-covering action while the groom huffs and puffs to keep up.
The people begin clapping to the rhythm. Action! That is what they look for in the Clydesdale. High and lively, so that the flowing feather on the back of the horse’s legs makes a big swish as he goes.
The judge’s eyes narrow as he looks for more than action. He rocks back on his heels, measuring through squinty eyes. From the top of the Clydesdale’s head to the top of his shoulder, from the top of his shoulder to the top of his rump, from the top of his rump to the top of his tail—are these distances nearly equal?
They are! But the judge’s face is a mask. He picks up the forehoofs and looks to see if they are bell-shaped and sound. Then, with a wave of his cane, he sends the Clydesdale to the far end.
An utter quiet fills the great auditorium as the judge, without the least haste, walks up and down before the line-up. Then he nods ever so slightly toward the Clydesdale, and the loud-speaker trumpets the words: “First is Number Ten, Ferguson’s Rob Roy, owned by . . . .”
But the owner’s name is swallowed in the happy din of approval.
Of all the draft horses the Clydesdale is the showman, his long reachy stride covering ground as if he wore seven-league boots.
It is his action and stamina that have made him the long-lived dray horse still to be seen on city streets, but more often in pairs or big hitches on farms all over the world. In Midwest United States and in Canada, in Australia and New Zealand, Clydesdale teams plow and harrow and harvest. And in Argentina in the zone of La Pampa, where the wheatlands flow on and on forever, many farmers use six- or even twelve-horse teams to haul their harvest to the railroads. The long processions look like enormous snakes winding across the land.
These big teams work together as one horse, but each pair has its own job. The leaders, for example, have a little farther to go on turns than the ones behind; so they need to be a shade quicker in their action. The wheel team has to be big and strong because, on a short turn, it is one wheeler that does practically all the pulling. But the swing pair, the ones in the middle, must be as nimble as cats; on short turns it takes quick footwork to keep out of the way of the pole.
If the Clydesdale could talk, he would have a Scotch burr in his voice, for he is the national horse of Scotland. It is good country in Scotland where he was foaled, a country of uplands and lowlands, rich in pasture and in the crops that horses like—oats and hay and apples and turnips. Here, between Glasgow on the north and Gana Hill on the south, the famous Clydesdales were first bred. They took their name from the River Clyde that winds its way through the rolling land. Heavy mists billow into the valley from the Atlantic Ocean, wetting the earth and keeping it always moist. This means a healthy hoof. Today the soundness of feet and legs is one of the chief assets of the Clydesdale.
Some books credit a Scottish nobleman, the sixth duke of Hamilton, with importing six Flemish stallions from England in 1715 to improve the quality of the native Scotch horse. Other history books say it was John Paterson, a farmer of Lochlyoch. But all agree that a black stallion named Blaze had a great influence in establishing the Clydesdale characteristics. He was foaled in 1779 with a wide, white stripe down his face which prompted his name. Perhaps he looked so shiny black because of the contrast made by his white markings. In addition to the white blaze he wore knee-length white stockings. When he trotted, those long white stockings made it appear as if he lifted his feet very high into the air and slapped them down with extraordinary vigor. No one was at all surprised when this action won for him the first prize in the Grass Market Show at Edinburgh.
To most of his descendants Blaze has bequeathed his stylish action and his showy white markings. But his black coat is only occasionally seen. The prevailing colors today are bay and brown.
No one knows who first started the custom of braiding the Clydesdale’s mane in an Aberdeen roll. It just seemed to be part of Scotland, like kilts and bagpipes. Instead of plaiting the mane in little pigtails, the Scotsmen started between the horses’ ears and braided horizontally along the crest, weaving into it long strands of bright-colored bunting or raffia. This made a roll along the crest but left the remainder of the mane hanging free. To emphasize the arch of the neck, rosebuds on long spikes were fastened at equal distances along the roll and made to stand up like tiny inverted pastebrushes. To this day no Clydesdale ever enters the show ring without having his mane done in an Aberdeen roll.
At the great fairs and stock shows a parade of the prize-winning draft horses of each breed is usually held on the last night of the show. The big powerful drafters prance majestically around the ring, apparently enjoying the spotlight and the applause of the crowd. To the especial delight of the Clydesdale owners, the music by which “the big ones” march is the shrill and windy skirling of the bagpipes! “It’s the verra instrument,” they lean over and whisper to the friend at their elbow. “And see the proud beasts niddin’ and noddin’ in pleasure!”
The Shire
THE SHIRE IS THE BIGGEST, broadest horse in the world. He is so big that other drafters seem almost small by comparison. He often grows more than seventeen hands high, and with four inches to a hand his height at the top of his shoulders is nearly six feet. Add to this his heavily crested neck and his strong head, and behold, a creature of heroic proportions!
He weighs a full ton or more. In fact, a 2,300-pound Shire is just a good typical animal with not a bit of fat to spare. He is all bone and brawn and bigness.
Even the feather on his legs is heavy. Instead of growing fine as in the Clydesdale and flowing from the back of the legs only, it tufts out in shaggy abundance all around. Some Shires have long locks of hair growing from their knees as well. It gives them a bold swagger, as if they wore bell-bottom trousers.
In the Shire’s native land this feathering served a purpose. His homeground was the marshy fen of Cambridgeshire and Lincolnshire in England. There the land is covered with a rushlike sedge grass, sharp as sword blades, and a horse’s heels and legs could be cut as he swished through it. The men of the fenland wear leather gaiters, but horses have to grow their own protection. For many months of the year the fenland oozes with water and bog. Here again the Shire’s hairy heels are good insulation; they help to keep the dampness out.
The big husky Shire is a hard worker. He eats up work just as a sawmill eats up logs. Not because he likes to work but because he likes to eat, and he has learned that when his day’s work is done he can bury his nose in a box of oats.
In the forests of the New England states and in Wisconsin he drags immense logs to the streams. While the cutting of timber goes on, however, he nods and dozes and peacefully switches at flies. Trees may be felled but the sound of crashing timber barely disturbs his napping, even when the falling log misses his muzzle by no more than a feeler. Nothing much excites him e
xcept the pit-a-pat of pouring oats. This little sound brings him alive, snorting with explosive pleasure.
Like the Belgian and the Percheron and the Clydesdale, the Shire is descended from the original Great Horse of the Middle Ages, known as the Black Horse of Flanders. The English people first saw one of these Great Horses when William the Conqueror came riding into Great Britain with a whole army mounted on the huge animals. William the Conqueror, himself, sat a mighty charger that bore him as if he were no more than a puny boy. Actually, William was not only a full-grown man in two hundred pounds of armor, but his horse wore another two hundred pounds besides!
“Here is a stout-hearted beast,” the English people exclaimed. “He could be a cart horse as well as a war steed. And we could load our carts to the topmost rail without feeling sorry for the beast.” And that is exactly what they did.
For the next span of years they sent to Belgium for the Great Horse, first for one, and then one more, and then many, and they crossed him with their large native mares and produced the Old English Black Horse. In physique he turned out to be even more massive than the war horse.
The new horse was just right, except for his name, Old English Black Horse. This was too long, and his color was more often bay or brown. So he was renamed Shire. Shire is the English word for county, and since the breed was developed in the shires of Lincoln and Cambridge, it seemed fit and proper to call him just that. Now many other shires, such as Kent and Derby and Huntingdon and Leicester, lay claim to the Shire horse, for they, too, are breeding him.
When Henry the Eighth was King of England, he issued a decree that horses less than fifteen hands high should be destroyed. There was not enough pastureland for all, and he wanted to develop a big brawny utility horse. Out of his decree came the real establishment of the Shire breed.
Album of Horses Page 5
