CHAPTER XVII.

MESSENGER AND HIS ANCESTORS.

Messenger the greatest of all trotting progenitors—Record of pedigrees in English Stud Book—Pedigrees made from unreliable sources—Messenger’s right male line examined—Flying Childers’ “mile in a minute”—Blaze short of being thoroughbred—Sampson, a good race horse—His size; short in his breeding—Engineer short also—Mambrino was a race horse with at least two pacing crosses; distinguished as a progenitor of coach horses and fast trotters—Messenger’s dam cannot be traced nor identified—Among all the horses claiming to be thoroughbred he is the only one that founded a family of trotters—This fact conceded by eminent writers in attempting to find others 205-221