Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: A manual of veterinary physiology / by F. Smith. Source: Wellcome Collection.
Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.
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![1 minute 39] seconds for 1 mile. The most severe galloping ever recorded was at Carlisle in 1701, where, owing to six heats being run, the winner galloped 24 miles. Quibbler, in 1786, galloped 23 miles round the flat at New- market in 57 minutes 10 seconds. The fastest pace at which trotting has been performed is 1 mile in 2 minutes 8| seconds. The horse was Sunol, the match taking place in the United States in October, 1891. The celebrated American trotting-horse Tom Thumb trotted 100 miles in 10 hours 7 minutes, including a stoppage of 37 minutes , an English mare did the same distance in 10 hours 14 minutes, including a stoppage of 13 minutes. Sir E. Astley's Phenomenon trotted 17 miles in 53 minutes. The walking performances are not numerous. Twenty- two miles in 3 hours 52 minutes was done by Sloven in 1793. All the old performances here quoted are from Youatt's work on ' The Horse.' Turning now to what may be expected of ordinary horses, we find that the average walk of a cavalry horse is 3*75 miles per hour ; the average trot is 7*5 miles per hour, or a mile in 8 minutes ; and a fast trot is 8?, miles per hour. A cavalry gallop is at the rate of 12 miles per hour.* The stride of horses at various paces was measured in a very ingenious manner by Stillman and Muybridge.f They give the stride at the walk as 5 feet 6 inches ; at the trot between 7 feet and 8 feet: at the canter about 10^, feet; and the gallop varying between 16 feet and 20^, feet, and they even speak of a stride of 25 feet. The question of the Weight which a horse can carry is one affecting the vital interests of the cavalry service ; there is a great difference between the weight a horse can carry and the effective weight he can carry. It has been stated by Desaguliers.^ that a horse at Stourbridge carried 1,232 lbs. of iron for a distance of S miles ! This either exceeded or must have ec^ualled his own body-weight, and the case is probably without parallel. * ' The Soldier's Pocket-Book,' Viscount Wolseley.](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b21933480_0372.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
