PREFACE. SINCE the publication of the Laws and Customs of Racing in 1852, the amusement of the Turf has rapidly spread wherever the British flag proclaims the Anglo-Saxon race. In America, in India, in China, the silk jacket is in request. On the Continent of Europe racing flourishes, and France, as usual, takes the lead. She deserves to triumph-no expense has been spared to procure our most valuable blood, our very best stallions, and to hire our cleverest trainers; and France has produced the best horse since the days of Bay Middleton. "Palmam qui meruit ferat." Every true sportsman must rejoice in the triumph of the English racehorse, the Anglo-Arabian, under any colours and in any country which may have the good fortune to possess them. Horse racing is a public benefit; any pursuit which produces a similarity of taste excites in an equal ratio a friendly feeling. National dislikes are owing to a faulty system of education, and to the monomania of religious intolerance. I therefore hail the extension of the sport as a general benefit to mankind, and as the medium of a more extended philanthropy. But as in all subjects there is a reverse, and as human institutions carry within themselves the germs of their own dissolution, I will not ignore the enemy which always threatens our extinction, "excessive gambling," or the obnoxious tendencies which are transparent when large sums of money are dependent upon the issue of a race. Betting on a great scale frequently produces grievous results, and the wholesome excitement of a fine race, or the patriotic inducement of improving the breed of horses, become secondary considerations. "Nunc juvenem imparibus video concurrere fatis, We have now arrived at the 13th and 14th generations from the imported Barbs and Arabians; there is nothing to be compared to them for speed, high courage, and stability. With a great object in view for 200 years, we have attained a marvellous success by adhering to one system— always seeking the best stallions, and by confining the breed to the pure blood of the sons of the desert. There is an ignorant notion abroad that the thoroughbreds have degenerated, because so many are broken down before they are four years old. It is no wonder, if we reflect that in these railroad times the young horses are destroyed by galloping and racing for ten months in the year, twoyear-olds running three and four times in a week. It is the old story-killing the goose for the golden eggs-otherwise there is no deterioration; on the contrary, the racehorse never was so good. When their equals are to be found, there will be an orthodox feeling for national jealousy. A very absurd crusade has been got up against light weights and short courses. Some writers condemn the system on the plea that it is a deterioration of the sport, and an encouragement to gamble. This is genuine twaddle, for as far as gambling is concerned, the more interesting the race, the more celebrated the competitors, the higher will be the speculations and the scale of betting. Racing without gambling is a hypocritical cant; every man is a gambler, whether he risks five shilling or five thousand pounds. The morning papers quote the odds every Tuesday and Friday. The sporting papers encourage gambling in all its branches,-advertisements from List Houses, from touts, from prophets who never err after the horses have passed the winning post, form the principal staple of their trade; without these ingredients they could not exist. Men must play their game according to their cards. If their horses are jades, they will hold fast to short courses; if they are slow and stout, they can expatiate on the merits of the Beacon Course. It is bad policy to restrict any person in his amusements when they neither border on cruelty or injustice, and unwise legislation to forbid short races to be run at Newmarket, the policy of which has tended to increase the number of short races on the country race-courses, to the prejudice of the interests of the racing metropolis; the only excusable interference on the part of the Jockey Club was to forbid yearlings running for public stakes under the penalty of future disqualification. There was sound sense in this resolution; but as far as light weights and short courses are concerned, the lighter the weight the less chance of breaking down the horse, and the shorter the course, the oftener you can run your horses without detriment. As all the great prizes are restricted to long courses, every breeder tries to produce the stoutest horse. A horse which can stay two miles is worth 2,0007.; a speedy jade is not worth 2007. There is no premium more sought for than this. In racing, wind is strength; a good heart and fine lungs in a delicate frame constitute stoutness. A hunting man's definition of a stout horse is a square, well-shaped animal up to 15 stone. This class often corresponds with our speedy T. Y. C. winners, generally on a grand scale. I have heard a celebrated Nimrod remark that the stoutest hunters he had ever known were thoroughbreds, notorious for speed, which could not get beyond six furlongs at Newmarket. In following hounds, when the cocktails were galloping, they were cantering. These great horses increase in numbers every year, because we generally breed by the largest stallions. Large horses, like big men, run fast, and seldom stay a distance, but they can carry weight, and under 16 stone would beat little clearwinded horses like Tim Whiffler, over six miles, when the latter would double distance them at light weights. Horses, like greyhounds, produce three remarkable runners out of 2,000. stoutness and speed is by comparison-the repudiated jades which win short races at light All |