THE THIRTIES 7 



Chapter III. 

 The 'Thirties. 



There were very few clean bred horses imported to Australia between 

 the arrival of Manto and the 'thirties of the last century. Such as they were, 

 these are not only very interesting, but several of them proved themselves to 

 be extremely valuable, and we have their representatives racing with credit 

 on our courses to this day. Thus, in 1826, The Cressey Company brought 

 to Tasmania the chestnut horse Buffalo, by Fyldener, a great grandson of 

 Herod, from Roxana, a granddaughter, on both sides of the house, of the 

 immortal Eclipse. It is a little surprising to find a commercial company in 

 those far-off days selecting a stallion of such superlative blood lines for the 

 purpose of producing utility horses in this distant land, for the racehorse can 

 scarcely yet have entered into its calculations when the company made its 

 purchases. We may be very certain that the managers had very wise heads 

 upon their shoulders. By the same ship they also imported the stallion 

 Bolivar, and the chestnut mare who became so famous in after days, Edella. 

 The latter produced three chestnuts to her fellow traveller Buffalo, the colts 

 Liberty and Fyldener, and the filly Curiosity. Edella was by Warrior, a 

 great grandson of Herod, from Risk, a great, great, granddaughter of Herod 

 from a Precipitate mare, and Precipitate was a granddaughter of Eclipse. You 

 can thus see how tremendously closely our ancestors bred in and in to Herod 

 and O' Kelly's mighty nonpareil Eclipse. Curiosity, the in-bred daughter of 

 Buffalo and Edella, was put to Peter Finn, a horse by Whalebone from a 

 Delpini mare, brought to Tasmania in 1 826, in the brig "Anne," and the result 

 was the bay filly Diana. This mare became the property of Mr. Field, of 

 Tasmania, and his family has religiously cherished her descendants ever since. 

 Mr. Field put Diana to Bay Middleton, a son of imported Jersey, who was by 

 Buzzard, a son of Blacklock from Cobweb, the great Bay Middleton's dam. 

 The result of the union was the fiily Resistance, who, when her time came, was 

 sent to Peter Wilkins, a brown horse by The Flying Dutchman from Boarding 

 School Miss. A daughter of hers was christened Edella, after her great-great- 

 grand dam. One wishes that those forebears of ours had had more ingenuity 

 in their choice of names. Edellas, Curiosities, Camillas, Violets and Cobwebs 

 fly in clouds through the earlier stud books. However that may be, this 

 particular Edella threw two great colts, Stockwell, by St. Albans, and Bagot, 

 by the same sire. Stockwell, after showing that he was a first-class racehorse, 

 unfortunately died, and Bagot, when his name had been changed to Malua, 

 was the greatest horse of his day, and founder of his family. This history of 

 the introduction of the horse into Australasia is an engrossing theme, but if 

 we gave way to our desires and followed each and all of them up through the 

 century we would run into many volumes. Skeleton was the only new arrival 

 during 182 7, and his name has, but for Woorak's successes, nearly died out 

 from our modern pedigrees. I, however, possess several letters from the 

 Marquis of Sligo to Mr. W. Reilly, Skeleton's importer, concerning him, and 

 pointing out to Mr. Reilly the horse's many qualities. 



As a piece of contemporary history, one of these letters is worthy of 

 reproduction in a history of the Racehorse in Australia: — 



"Mansfield Street, 

 "London, 



"30th March, 1832. 



"My Dear Sir, — 



"In reply to your note requesting me to give my opinion of Skeleton, 



Vv'ho formerly belonged to me, and whom you have sent to New South 



