BREEDING 45 



Portland. Partly from this source and 

 partly because the Horse Improvement 

 Commissioners some years ago took the 

 Royal grant off the Queen's Plates and 

 gave the money for premium stallions, 

 the country is now quite inundated with 

 good sires. 



I hold the opinion myself, private 

 enterprise would for several years, at 

 least, provide sufficient suitable stallions, 

 and that the present Imperial grant flows 

 in a wrong channel. It is the mares that 

 are not to be found. It is a sweeping 

 assertion to make, but I do not believe 

 there are more than forty or fifty mares 

 in farmers' hands in Leicestershire and 

 Rutland at all fit to be classed as hunter 

 brood mares. There are, however, 

 hundreds of under-sized, angular, three- 

 cornered, nondescript mares bred from 

 with miserable results, and I think that 



