THE DEVELOPMENT OF STEEPLECHASING 167 



Style, and is a comfortable mount only for a bold 

 rider. At least one Grand National winner carried 

 his master admirably to hounds in the season of 

 1897-8 — Ilex, who won the greatest of cross-country 

 events in 1890. 



It is not in the hunting field that recruits are sought, 

 for the reason above given. Hunters have not the 

 speed to live with the rivals they are certain to meet 

 in important races. A very few years back, indeed, 

 when the entries for the Grand National were 

 published, it was the custom to class them into 

 "hunters" and "handicap steeplechasers," but in truth 

 the distinction was purely technical and really meant 

 nothing. Steeplechase horses are usually drawn from 

 the flat, and, as a rule, they graduate through a course 

 of hurdle racing, though it is by no means every 

 hurdle racer that can, even if he tries, earn distinction 

 " over a country," and there are good 'chasers who 

 have not the speed to win over hurdles. The oddest 

 fact about steeplechasing, however, is that very often 

 horses which have not been able to stay for five 

 furlongs on the flat can win races of four miles and 

 more over a country. A really satisfactory explana- 

 tion of this has still to be found, though that their fine 

 speed enables them to hold their own with less speedy 

 animals without exertion may tend to elucidate the 

 mystery ; but what makes the circumstance still more 

 remarkable is that the chief steeplechases are run in 

 time which stands out well when compared with that 



