Will any reader of the Gardeners’ Chronicle be so kind as to take the trouble to inform me how Dun or Mouse-coloured Ponys with a dark stripe down their backs are bred? This breed is common in Norway on the banks of the Indus & in the Malayan archipelago, & is in some respects very interesting in relation to the origin of the domestic Horse.² Is this peculiar colour thrown from Ponys of any other colour, or must one or both parents be Dun?

Occasionally ponys of this colour have a cross stripe on the shoulder, like that on the Ass, & likewise bars on the legs. If anyone who has bred ponys of this colour, would inform me whether their stripes are more distinct in the colt than in aged ponys, I sh^d. be greatly obliged. The transverse bars sometimes seen on the legs of the Ass are said to be plainest during growth.

Ch. Darwin Down, Bromley Kent