i6o 



RIDING 



except that of horses kept as stallions, and of these even the names 

 of some are now totally forgotten. 



The first volume of the New South Wales Stud-book, while 

 giving the names and pedigrees of a few celebrated old im- 

 ported mares, furnishes no account whatever of the foals which 

 they bred ; but at intervals in its pages we meet with these 

 unsatisfactory expressions : ' out of an imported thoroughbred 

 mare,' or 'granddam, an imported thoroughbred mare ;' state- 

 ments too vague to be accepted as evidence of purity of blood. 



Hunting in Australasia. 



An extensive sale of thoroughbred stock took place on the 

 death of Mr. C. Smith, of New South Wales, in 1845, an d to 

 the catalogue published at that sale we are indebted for much 

 of the information which has enabled the compilers of Austra- 

 lasian stud-books to trace the blood of the earlier racehorses. 

 In Tasmania a stud-book existed in 1847, but it was not printed, 

 and the manuscript copies were naturally few in number. 



The first regular stud-book was published in New South 

 Wales in 1859, and a similar publication appeared about the 

 same time in Victoria, while it was not till 1862 that any similar 

 publication was issued in New Zealand. The materials at hand 

 for the compilation of these publications were scanty and not 



