In the period around 8000BC Britain was physically attached to both Ireland and Europe and there was free migration of animals from Asia and Africa. It is likely that the Celtic pony took this route and established itself in Wales, Ireland (Conemara) and the Hebrides (Shetland). The large Bronze Age collection of fragments of harness and small (less than 3") bits found in North Wales, indicates that ponies were being used for harness work at that time. Certainly ponies were very much in evidence in Wales during the conquest of Julius Caesar (55-54BC) who wrote about their speed and docility as chariot horses and their activity as riding horses.

The next mention of Welsh Ponies is in 1188A.D. when the Welsh Hills were reported to be "full of ponies". One theory is that much of the final type of the Welsh Pony and Cob was established at this stage through the influence of stallions brought back from the East by the Crusaders, but there is no firm evidence to confirm this.

Welsh Ponies returned to prominence in 1535 when Henry VIII ordered the destruction of all horses under 13hh because they were too small to carry the weight of a knight in a full suit of armour and were eating valuable grazing. Fortunately the inaccessibility of the mountainous areas of Wales prevented this death sentence from being carried out in that area and the law was later repealed by Queen Elizabeth I.

 The harsh climate and continual persecution, not only by Henry VIII, but also by the lowland farmers who drove the ponies back into the hills whenever they went in search of better grazing, led to the development of a very hardy pony with plenty of bone, a thick mane and tail and lots of feather. The ponies were of predominantly dark colors with blacks, browns and dark duns being proven the most hardy.

ILLUSTRATED VINTON & CO., LTD. 9, NEW BRIDGE STREET, LONDON, E.G. 1900

When it was made evident that very much larger numbers of mounted infantry were required, the remount agents were instructed to purchase cobs, and to obtain these in quantity it was necessary to go to foreign countries, the United States, ying power, and whose mode of life is the best possible preparation for "roughing it" in South Africa.

Very different is the case with the animals shipped from England. For generations, now, horses for the saddle and lighter draught work have been very largely bred less as necessaries than luxuries; the conditions of their lives are artificial in a high degree, and the constitution which could formerly withstand exposure, hard and continuous work and scanty feed, has been softened by pampering. To take such horses out of their stables where the ternperature is regulated, where they are warmly clothed and regularly fed, and despatch them to endure the hardships of campaigning in countries where hay and oats are unknown or unprocurable, and the forage obtainable is unsuited to English chargers in short, to most severely tax their powers under a set of conditions entirely opposed to those to which they are accustomed is to invite heavy mortality.

BREEDING SMALL HORSES.

Assuming that the peculiar suitability of horses between 14 hands and 14 hands 3 inches for mounted infantry and light cavalry purposes is acknowledged by the authorities, it behooves us to turn our attention to the task of breeding. The high prices obtainable for first-class polo ponies have given a stimulus to pony-breeding, and it may be said the foundations of the industry have been laid. What the present remount market is to the breeder of hunters, so may the market for mounted infantry cobs be to the breeder of polo ponies, but with this difference, that the latter, being handicapped by the height limit of 14 hands 2 inches, will have a larger proportion of ''misfits." What is required is an animal between 14.0 and 14.3 hands; it must be stout and (* See Ponies Past and Present, by Sir Walter Gilbey, Bart. Vinton & Co., Ltd. 3) able to carry weight, capable of covering long distances at fair speed, able to subsist on coarse or poor food for weeks together without losing condition, strong of constitution to withstand the exposure inevitable on a campaign, and the more tractable the better. To get small horses endowed with these qualifications we must look to the breeds which possess them in marked degree, to the ponies of the Welsh Hills, Exmoor, the New Forest, the Fell districts, and West of Ireland. In these we have ponies ranging in height from 12.2 to 13.3 or 14 hands ; they are compact, sturdy, and untiring ; they can carry weights which are out of all ratio to their size ; they live on grass, and the open-air life they lead, year in year out, has made them completely independent of the luxurious " coddling ' bestowed upon other horses.

These ponies lack only the size required in our mounted infantry horse, and these essentials we can obtain from the sire we shall select. what sire is more likely to get the desired pony than the Arab ? We might use a small Thoroughbred with excellent results, but having regard to the rarity with which we find good bone and sound constitution in the Thoroughbred, and also having regard to the inherent soundness and stoutness of the Eastern horse, we shall probably obtain more satisfactory young stock from Forest and Moorland dams if we use the Arab sire. Blood, it is truly urged, gives the superior speed and courage required in the polo-pony, but let us not forget that Arabs were the sires from which all our modern race-horses are descended. The best horses on the Turf today may be traced to one of the three famous sires the Byerly Turk imported in 1689, the Darley Arabian in 1706, and the Godolphin Arabian in 1730: all of them, it may be remarked, horses under 14 hands.

By going back to the original strain we shall obtain all the useful qualities Thoroughbreds possess without those undesired characteristics, greatly increased size, great speed, delicacy of constitution and complete inability to lead a natural life which man's long-maintained endeavours to breed race horses have implanted in them. In a word, we shall obtain a natural and not an artificial horse ; the race-horse is practically everything the mounted infantry cob must not be.

By using the Arab we may expect to obtain the qualities race horses boasted a century and a half or two centuries ago, when they stood 14 hands to 14.3 the famous Gimcrack is said to have measured 14 hands 1 inch. There is much to be said in favour of the policy of returning to the original Eastern stock to find suitable sires for our proposed breed of ponies. Arab breeders have continued to breed for stoutness, endurance and good looks. By going to Arab stock for our sires we might at the beginning sacrifice some measure of speed; but what was lost in that respect would be more than compensated by the soundness of constitution and limb which are such conspicuous traits in the Eastern horse. By crossing the Arab on mares of our forest and moorland breeds we shall obtain the increased size and speed required, while it will be possible to preserve the valuable qualities of the dam.

Those qualities, the hardiness, robustness of constitution, sureness of foot, and ability to thrive on poor feed, are the natural outcome of the conditions under which they have lived for centuries ; and to preserve them in the young stock, it will be necessary to rear the crossbred foals under conditions as nearly natural as their constitution will allow. What those conditions should be circumstances must determine; but it is possible to combine large measure of liberty with a certain amount of shelter from the rigours of winter, such as the foal with Arab blood in his veins would require. To take up the young stock as soon as weaned, stable and feed them artificially, though this course would preserve them from the risks of exposure, would produce failure in other directions. It would encourage undue physical development while undermining that capacity for endurance of hardship which is so essential. Whether, by careful attention to mating and management, it would be possible to establish a breed of small horses as a fixed type is a question only prolonged experience will be able to answer.

It is quite certain that we shall never be able to reckon on getting stock which, when fully grown and furnished, will neither exceed nor fall short of the limit of 14 hands 2 inches, at which the breeder will aim with the prizes of the polo pony market in his mind's eye. But there is sound reason to think that we can build upon an Arab and Forest or Moorland pony foundation a breed of small horses such as we need for mounted infantry. There are difficulties in the way; and not the least is the peculiar care and watchfulness that must be exercised in order to hit the "happy medium" between artificial life, with its attendant drawbacks of probable overgrowth and certain delicacy of constitution, and the free, natural existence, which may prove fatal to the cross - bred youngsters and will certainly check their growth. Having shown the great utility of small horses for work requiring endurance, hardiness, and weight-carrying power, as proved by the writings of authorities who, in several instances, employed them merely because they could procure no other animals, and learned what their qualities are by experience, we may briefly summarise what has been said in regard to the foundation stock we possess. (1) The pony dams of our Forest and Moorland breeds cannot be surpassed. (2) The sire chosen should be a small thoroughbred or an Arab. If a half-breed sire is used his dam should be one not less than three parts thoroughbred. (3) Inasmuch as the forest and moorland ponies owe their small size and soundness to the hardships of the free and natural conditions in which they live, their half-bred produce should (a) Lead a similarly free and natural life as far as climate permits, in order to inure them to the hardships of warfare and general work : (b) Should exist, as far as possible, on natural herbage, as in all cases artificial feeding tends to render them less hardy and enduring.