He was among the finest horses ever to stand on grass, the handsomest Morgan his century had seen and the king of roadsters when a stylish horse was the sine qua non of a successful man. He sired well over a thousand foals, each a prized near-replica of himself, and he was thought to have been the best brood mare sire in New England history, perhaps in world history.

His name was Daniel Lambert, and he came by his quality as good horses generally do--from the blood of both sire and dam. His dam, Fanny Cook, was a mare of ancient royal pedigree, tracing back to the Darley Arabian, the Godolphin Arabian and the Byerley Turk--her pedigree remarkably similar to the supposed pedigree of Justin himself.

Daniel Lambert's sire, Ethan Allen, was considered the best son of Black Hawk; Black Hawk was the best son of Sherman; and Sherman the best son of Justin. If motorized wheels had never been invented, his name would still be on every lip as the founder of the most useful and prolific family of Morgan horses; but as it is, his line nearly died. That it has not died, and that a hundred and thirty-seven years after his birth, Daniel Lambert is again enjoying fame is a tale of patient human devotion and the ultimate survival of quality bloodstock.

Now, seven generations since Daniel Lambert a thirty-four-year old Lambert stallion, Criterion, still enjoys the summer grass in West Virginia. Like Daniel, he is a bright chestnut with a lighter mane and tail, but it isn't really Daniel he resembles most. Put his photograph beside an old woodcut and you'll see the spitting image of Sherman Morgan, that legendary finest son of Figure.

Susan and Shannon Hanley didn't set out to resurrect a Morgan family. During a period of job burnout in the early seventies, they did what so many dream of doing: they sold their house near Manhattan and bought a 183-acre farm in West Virginia. With a daughter and a son, then ten and eight, they set out to make their living farming, raising sheep and cattle at first, and then, before long, breeding Morgan horses.