“not finelie yet stronglie made he is of great stature. The mares also be of a great stature; strong, long, large, fayre and fruitful; and besides that, will endure great labour in their wagons, in which I have seene two or three mares to go lightly away with such a burthen as is almost uncredible.”
“But now to content the countryman his desire, which seeketh to breede horses for draught or burthen, where should I wysh him to provyde hymselfe of Mares and Stallions better than here in Englande.”
“I have knowne some carriars that go with carts, to be so exquisit in their choyse of horses, as onlesse been as commely to the eye as good in their worke they would not buye them; insomuch as I have seen somtyme drawing in their carts better proportioned horses than I have knowne to be fynely kept in stables, as jewels for the saddle. The horse that is meete for the cart, may serve also for the burthen, bycause he is strong and able to beare much.”
In the second edition, however, we find the recommendation to the countryman to provide himself with stock of English raising qualified by a remark which confirms the author’s reference to the general weakness of the war horses of the time, and indicates that the “misfits” of the Great Horse breed, as we might suppose, were relegated to the waggon and the plough. The passage “But now to content ... better than here in Englande,” continues:—
“whereas he maie easilie find a number of strong jades more meet for that purpose than for the saddle, and all for lack of good order of breeding which if it might be once observed in this realme I believe there would be so good and so faire horses bred here as in anie place in Christendome.”
The need of more legislation on the subject, or better administration of the existing laws, is here very plainly indicated.
When discussing the advantages of gelding horses for use on the road, Blundeville incidentally bears out what we already know, viz., that the animals used by heavily armoured cavalry were entires. “Our light horsemen here in England,” he says, “do in like manner serve upon geldings in the warres ... partly for servants to ride on and to carie their males [mail] and cloke bagges.”
The invention of gunpowder and its application to hand firearms produced the inevitable effect upon heavy armour in the last quarter of the sixteenth century. Sir John Smythe writing in 1589, the year after the famous Spanish Armada fiasco, says contemptuously of the cavalry of Spain: “Their horsemen also serving on horseback with launces or any other weapon they think very well armed with some kind of headpiece, a collar, and a deformed light bellied beast.” The introduction of coaches at this time, and the encouragement of racing at a somewhat later period also tended to encourage the breeding of lighter horses in England.
JAMES I.
We now take leave of our Elizabethan instructors and come to records relating to a generation later. In the Herbert MS., published as vol. xx. of the Montgomeryshire collection, we find on page 148 an estimate of the cost of horsing an expedition which was being fitted out to enforce the claims of the Prince Palatine, son-in-law to James I., to the Crown of Bohemia. This estimate was laid before the Privy Council on January 13th, 1620. Ten thousand men were to be despatched from England; it was calculated that the baggage of this army would weigh 1,150 tons, to transport which as many carts each carrying one ton, would be needed, and for each waggon eight cart horses. It was further estimated that for the conveyance of the officers, the sick and the wounded, 380 waggons would be wanted, and that three horses must be provided for each of these vehicles. The scheme laid before the Privy Council proposed that part, at least, of the 10,412 cart horses thus required should be taken up where they could be hired by the day “in the Low Countries or where they may best be hadde. They with the carters to drive and keep them.” The hire was estimated at 2s. per diem, while the cost of the horses, if bought outright, “with harness and furniture,” would, it was anticipated, be £9 apiece. The framers of this estimate appended thereto a note or recommendation which reflects the comparative merits of English and foreign cart horses at the time. “We think it necessary that, besides, 200 strong cart horses such as cannot be hired should be bought or continually kept for the use of the ordnance and munition.” The cost of these Strong or Great Horses was put down at £15 per head—the modern equivalent of that seemingly modest sum being perhaps £100—and the lieutenants and deputy-lieutenants of counties throughout England were to be required to certify what proportion of horses fit for this service “each sheire canne affourd upon all occasions on enterprise.”