40 England's horses, 



admit of more than routine attention, even in exceptional 

 cases crying for redress. The tvirf men have, honestly, no 

 right to complain if the country is awakened to the expe- 

 diency of withholding a national grant, the objects of which 

 their own private system and speculations have positively 

 and absolutely nullified. Those two-year-old races and 

 handicapping have " put the extinguisher " upon any hopes 

 of good being effected by our gracious sovereign's liberal 

 donations to the sustenance and promulgation of horse- 

 breeding. The inducements for finding out the merits of 

 the race-horse at too early an age are so cogent and 

 numerous as to upset the hope of any promising colt or 

 filly being j^reserved from the deleterious system of the 

 training stable until a matured frame and indurated 

 muscles might defy it. And a horse capable of contending 

 for Her Majesty's guineas would be spoiled by a brilliant 

 contest therein for the more paying "game " of winning a 

 handicap, so is generally reserved for that. 



The tissues of a horse are not fully developed until he is 

 six or seven years old, says a well-appreciated veterinary 

 authority, and, therefore, in a tAvo-year-old, must be 

 naturally Aveak and slender ; in proof of which remember 

 that the ends of the bones {E-pJcvphysis) at this age are not 

 joined by long union to the common shaft, rendering 

 them incapable of resisting the tension imposed upon them 

 by the tendons and ligaments, during excessive action. 

 Nothing interferes so much with the wise laws of Nature 

 as early training. It is said that " Nature is ever econo- 

 mical in her means and wise in her ends;" but early training 

 frustrates her "means," and, consequently, defeats her " ends." 

 As in the vegetable kingdom, the seed placed in the ground 

 will not be hurried, but has to pass through many stages 

 before the full ear of corn is developed, so in the animal 

 kingdom, the primary cell has to undergo many changes 



