438 A HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH TURF. 



about his own time, we find that Goldfinder and Woodpecker are traced back (on the 

 figure system) to a matron of so much higher value that she is 37 places ahead of the 

 tap-root of PotSos, first on the list, in fact ; Phenomenon' ' s ancestress is 36 ahead ; 

 Paymaster s and Justice s 35 ; Wildair 1 s, Sweet }] r iiiiaiii s and Plunder 1 s, 34 ; 

 Trent/iam's and Florizel's, 33 ; and the list might be similarly analysed all through 

 the years when PotSos was alive. Now if these original mares were really the sources 

 of excellence in various racers, it is clear that the strength of their influence would 

 be felt more strongly before other conflicting strains of blood had been at work than 

 in later years when the original strain would have to work through many complicated 

 channels. We should, in fact all theories apart have expected that any ancestress 

 which could count PotSos in her direct line, would, if she had been responsible for his 

 excellence, have gone on producing sires or winners. Yet we can only find one winner 

 of the Derby to her name, Sir Thomas (1788), and no more sires at all, from that day 

 to this. If, on the other hand, it is to the daughter of Massy 1 s Black Barb that we 

 are to put down the excellence of Gladiateur (1862), or of Galtce More (1894), how 

 are we to explain the fact that when her influence was far purer upon her descendants 

 she never produced a Derby winner before 1807 (E/ecn'oi.] or a St. l.eger before 1801 

 (Quiz], and this in spite of the fact that, if Mr. Allison is right, her merit in a list of 

 fifty is as the fifth to the thirty-eighth {PotSos)} Mr. Allison says, and very possibly 

 with complete accuracy, that a family takes a long time to establish its female line, 

 but that once established that line is firm. This may be urged to account for the 

 advance from the Paymaster of 1766 to the Isinglass of 1890, in the family of the dam 

 of the two True Blues ; but if so, it can scarcely be urged also as an explanation of the 

 lonely splendour of PotSos and Sir Thomas in the family of Tlnvaites Dun Mare. 

 Another thing also stands in need of explanation. If we accept the very large: 

 assumption that it is to these original mares rather than to any male influence that our 

 modern thoroughbreds owe their excellence, how is it that that excellence is not as 

 much attributed (in Family No i, for instance) to Promise, Prunella, Penelope, 

 Clementina, Prairie Bird, Queen BertJia and the rest, as to any male interlopers. And 

 if in Family No. 2 there occur such mighty matrons as Crucifix, Hermione, or 

 Martha Lynn, why are they subordinated in value to the Burion Barb Mare ? Was 

 it really more to the clam of the two True Blues than to Pocaliontas that we owed 

 Stpckwell or King Tom ? 



I have quoted already so many of the interesting statistics which form a part of 

 Mr. Allison's elaboration of Mr. Bruce Lowe's system, that I shall not be suspected 



