438 THE HORSE 



1888 to 1271 in 1895, Dut the figure in recent years has 

 usually been from 100 to 300 higher. The success of the 

 work is better gauged by the honours awarded to the produce 

 of premium stallions, and these for seven consecutive years 

 (1898 to 1904) numbered 283, 357, 425,406, 355, 404, and 455. 

 At the spring show of the Hunters' Improvement Society in 

 1905, the prizes for the best group of three young hunters by 

 the same sire were awarded to the produce of one of the 

 King's premium stallions, " Wales." The number of stallions 

 rejected for unsoundness has recently diminished much ; out 

 of ninety exhibited each year, only five failed to pass veterinary 

 examination in 1905 against seventeen rejected in 1889. 



" A record has been kept of all breeders who have had 

 mares served by the premium stallions since 1888, for the 

 benefit of the War Office and the Remount Department." 



It was a judicious act to discontinue the payment for 

 racing purposes of the sum of .3360, which was formerly 

 given from Her Majesty's Privy Purse for Queen's plates, as 

 the sum was much too small to encourage first-class racing. 

 It is questionable, to say the least of it, whether it was right 

 to give for the encouragement of horse-breeding such a 

 paltry sum, even when increased as it was by a Parliamentary 

 vote of 1740 per annum. If it be a wise policy to encourage 

 horse-breeding by State aid, the money thus devoted to it 

 is altogether inadequate. If a larger sum is ultimately 

 provided, the Commission will naturally be requested to 

 take a more comprehensive view of the situation, and to 

 extend encouragement to other breeds than the Thorough- 

 bred. A Parliamentary Blue-book of 1 38 pages, containing 

 the minutes of evidence taken before the Royal Commission 

 on Horse-breeding, was published in 1890, and the Tenth 

 Progress Report was issued in I9O5, 1 signed by Portland 

 (President), Coventry, Ribblesdale, Middleton, Henry Chaplin, 

 Jacob Wilson, John Gilmour, and J. Bowen Jones. 



The efforts to improve the breed of light-legged horses 

 are not confined to Great Britain. The Royal Dublin 

 Society issued in 1892 the first volume of its Register of 

 Thoroughbred Stallions for service under the horse-breeding 

 scheme of 1892. The conditions were that the stallion should 

 be entered in Weatherby's Stud Book, should be over three 

 1 To be had from Wyman & Sons, Limited, London. 



