INTRODUCTION 5 



enormous-sized book had anything beyond the 

 merest outline of the contents been given. Yet 

 thousands of sportsmen and sportswomen are 

 fond of books on horses, which are not technical 

 nor dull, but do not realise that there is such a 

 thing as equine literature in an elevated form. 

 They know, of course, that Greeks and Romans 

 in the dim past made references to chargers 

 and beasts of burden, and they usually hate 

 endeavouring to translate them. 



Many lovers of books readily admit that the 

 late Whyte Melville wrote standard works on 

 modern hunting fiction. They willingly grant 

 that The Field, Sportsman, Sporting Life, The 

 Sporting Ti7nes, The Badmhiton Magazine, 

 Baity s Magazine, The Cozmtry Gentle77ian, 

 County Gentlemaii, The Illustrated Sporting and 

 Dramatic, and other newspapers and periodicals 

 which are devoted to race-meetings and sport 

 generally, are equine literature or journalism ; 

 but they little think, when they have named the 

 above, that they have hardly touched upon a 

 gigantic subject. 



By kind permission of the editor of Bailys 

 Magazine, articles from the author's pen which 

 have appeared from time to time in that well- 

 known sporting journal have again been offered 

 to the public in book form in this work. Also 

 the author must acknowledge similar kindness 

 shown him by the editors of The Badminton 

 Magazine, The Sporting Life, The Globe, and 

 The Live Stock Journal. 



The difficulties over the illustrations have been 



