Stallions should be Hired. 



Ill 



celebrated for getting half-breds. I have known him serve 150 mares, and have 120 foals dropped to 

 him in a season." 



On the same question, W. Shaw {Q. 1156) says: "A horse that travels will cover three times as many 

 mares as one that stands at home. One horse I had leaped 192 mares in one season — you will find it 

 set down in my book — and only had 22 barren mares. If you only take care of the horse, the more he 

 travels the more foals he will get. If you take proper precautions, he will travel thirty miles a day, 

 resting on Sundays." 



From Shorthorns down to pigs and poultry, the whole farm stock of the kingdom has been improved 

 by the selection of male animals, maintained not by Government but by private individuals, either for pleasure 

 or profit, or both. There are instances where within a few years one parson with a taste for pedigree 

 pigs has improved the swine for twenty miles round his church. 



In order to multiply good thoroughbred sires let the members of local agricultural societies encourage 

 the formation of horse improvement committees with a 



STALLION HIRING FUND. 



Let there be established in every district where there are any considerable number of persons inclined 

 to breed horses a Stallion Hiring Fund ; the money so raised would procure a direct result. The committee 

 of each local society would hire one or more stallions for the season, which they would send round the 

 district, and give the preference to subscribers. This plan would require much smaller subscriptions than 

 the purchase of stallions, and would secure for the owners of mares in the district the services of horses 

 at moderate fees that had been selected because suitable to that district. Kent and Devon might not 

 require the class of stallion fancied in Holderness. The hiring system once introduced would spread, 

 and the demand create a supply of stallions " to let." The subscribers would be recouped for their 

 subscriptions by getting the use of superior animals at a reasonable fee. The sum required would not be 

 large for each "stallion circle" or district. About ;^ioo a year will hire a good thoroughbred stallion. 

 To that sum must be added the cost of his keep and management for the season by a professional stallion 

 leader, paid parlly by salary and partly by fees. 



Private associations have done everything great in England in agriculture, commerce, manufactures, 

 and public works ; and private enterprise can, if directed by our natural leaders, the country gentlemen, 

 of England, improve the quality of thoroughbred hunter sires and their produce. This, I contend, 

 will be more effectually done by the steady demand of annual hirings than the lottery of prizes, although 

 there is no reason why both systems should not flourish side by side. 



All that this plan requires to become universal is a few influential patrons and careful and energetic 

 managers. It would spread as local agricultural and horticultural societies have spread, and create a 

 market for slow (in a racing sense) sound stallions with useful action, that are now too often a drug on 

 the market, because not related to some famous unsound racehorse, such as Oulston.*— Fro/n a Pamphlet, 

 dedicated to the Earl of Rosebery, " On the Deterioration of the British Horse." (1S78.) 



* Death of Oulston. — This son of Melbourne and Alice Hawthorn was lately destroyed at the age of twenty-six years, he 

 being quite worn out. Oulston was a good racehorse, although not quite amongst the first flight horses of his year ; on two occasions 

 the great Rataplan went down before him. As a sire Oulston was not a success, as, although a large number of winners claim 

 paternity from him, the best of his get was Russley, who, like his sire, was a roarer, which affliction is said to have lost Oulston the 

 St. Leger. — Sporting Paper. 



