TRAINING AND BREEDING. 



411 



from that to which breeders of 1902 are looking forward, and any comparison 

 between results so inevitably different would be extremely misleading even if 

 the requisite data had come down to us. As many horses are now nominated for 

 the Derby every year as were in training during the whole twelve months two 

 centuries ago. The great prizes of our Turf are given to young horses. The 

 services of fashionable sires are so much in request that a stallion with a first-class 

 record and of high descent is sure to be sent early to the stud. Even if he were not, 

 the system of handicapping, on which all modern racing is founded, would soon 

 drive him off the course whatever might have been his owner's wishes. The high 

 price of a good yearling 

 in these days practically 

 necessitates in most 

 cases a quick return for 

 the outlay of so much 

 capital, and if that re- 

 turn is not secured by 

 entering him for ten 

 times more races than 

 was the case a century 

 ago, it must be reaped 

 by getting early stud 

 fees. Then, too, the 

 enormous percentage of 

 expensive failures in the 

 yearlings purchased is 



an equally strong incentive in the same direction, while the fee now charged 

 for the service of a stallion as much as 600 gs. for a fashionable sire is a 

 much heavier risk to take than the 60 gs. charged for Touchstone, or the 25 gs. 

 asked for fferod. Many and complicated have been the theories by which breeders 

 have endeavoured to avoid these losses and produce "a certainty." But year after 

 year the animals under their charge have refused to be treated as so many four- 

 legged multiplication tables, and the foals thrown have shown much the same 

 proportion of " rank bad "uns." Nature deals out the cards by processes known 

 only to herself. The hand takes a good deal of playing, even when it happens 

 to be extraordinarily strong in trumps ; but the time has not yet arrived when 



' Rockingham " (1830) by "Humphrey Clinker." 



