SOME EARLY VJCTORIAN OWNERS. 



477 



interesting to know that Thomas Dawson thought Touchstone a better horse than 

 either The Flying Dutchman or West Australian. The Polly Agnes whom I 

 mentioned as having been presented to James Snarry was by The Cwe, out 

 of Miss Agnes, a daughter (by Irish Birdcaicher) of Agnes (by Clarion], who 

 was bought by old John Osborne in 1844 with her clam Annette (by Priam]. 

 At Middleham Agnes 

 proved a worthy rival 

 of Malton's famous brood 

 mare Queen Mary. Lily 

 Agnes, who lies buried 

 at Eaton near Shotover 

 and Angelica, was tried 

 on Middleham Moor in 

 the spring as a lop-eared, 

 ragged-hipped two-year- 

 old, and beat Enbhro- 

 syne and Organist (both 

 three-year-olds) at even 

 weights. That season 

 she was never beaten. 



Next year she won the Northumberland Plate, the York Cup, and the Doncaster 

 Cup. As a four-year-old she ran a dead heat with the French Figaro II. for the 

 Queen's Plate at Manchester, and won the decider by a head, with other successes, 

 including a victory over Aventuriere for the Ebor Handicap, which very much 

 upset Mr. Fred Swindell. Next year, again, she won the Queen's Plate at Chester, 

 and went to the stud as a six-year-old. 



It is interesting to notice that the excellence of the Agnes blood holds its own 

 even during the last Ascot Meeting that has finished just as I revise these pages 

 amid the rains of June, 1903. Lord Rosebery's Oriole, a three-year-old daughter of 

 Ladas (whose other daughter Montem was the prettiest two-year-old filly at Ascot), 

 won the Coronation Stakes. She combined the blood of Rataplan, Doncaster, 

 and Blair Athol, with inbreeding to Ellen Home through Paradigm and Rouge 

 Rose, the whole being based on the Agnes taproot, which provided other winners 

 at the same meeting in Lord Howard de Walden's Zinfandel and his Majesty's 

 Mead, besides the two-year-old Rydal Head, who was not so successful this time, and 



" Lanercosf" by " Liverpool" (1835). 



