152 VALUES. 



The advice which the Earl of Onslow gives regarding 

 bidders at auction covers the ground so thoroughly that it 

 is here quoted in full : 



" Many purchasers are led away from the sum which they had deter- 

 mined to give by the excitement of competition at an auction and think that 

 after all, for a horse that has taken their fancy, five, ten and so on up to fifty 

 guineas more than they had intended to give will not hurt them. This is 

 the most mistaken course to pursue, for the price which a purchaser ulti- 

 mately gives he might probably have all the advantages of a trial and more 

 complete veterinary examination of a dealer's horse, while his fancied 

 competitor, whom he thinks must, from his evident determination to have 

 the animal, know that he is going to get good value for his money, will 

 probably turn out to be a friend of the owner and is only bidding as a means 

 of placing a high reserve price upon the animal. To buy at auction requires 

 time and patience ; and to buy cheap, a man needs strength of mind when 

 he sees a horse he has taken a fancy to going for prices higher than he had 

 previously decided to pay." — " Driving,''' p. 62, Badminto7i Library. 



VALUES. 



In order to acquire a knowledge of values the novice will 

 be compelled to spend some little time in attending sales and 

 use much discrimination in drawings his conclusions. That 

 different t3^pes of horses have their special value may be 

 seen by the following : 



" Many horses that are kept for use are to be valued, and that nearly as 

 closely as any other useful article. Cart horses can be valued to a great 

 nicety by any man accustomed to the buying and selling them ; so can good, 

 fair, useful, thirty or forty pound harness horses for other work ; even car- 

 riage horses can be estimated when they are merely a fair, useful sort, worth, 

 we will say, from a hundred and twenty to a hundred and fifty the pair ; 

 beyond this their price is almost nominal, for what a pair of singularly beau- 

 tiful well-matched horses, with extraordinary high, grand and fashionable 

 action, would bring, depends on the purse, inclination or folly of the pur- 

 chaser ; such a pair would be a little fortune to a man if the young and beau- 

 tiful wife of a rich old man took a fancy to them ; the fortunate owner would 



