262 HORSE-RACING IN ENGLAND 



The sporting newspapers, therefore, which 

 exist solely through and for the public, have 

 taken in hand the breeders and owners of race- 

 horses, and by preaching and bullying and inter- 

 viewing and employing horse - watchers, and 

 issuing 'training reports,' and by various other 

 means, have, as representatives of the public, 

 usurped, as it were, a position which enables 

 them to coerce more or less gently the owner or 

 breeder, or both, of race-horses, until he wonders 

 whether he can call his soul his own, and until, 

 though he be a Hamar Bass, he is constrained at 

 last to yield, even in a matter of mere nomen- 

 clature. 



Nor is it only as regards the absolute necessity 

 of giving some kind of name that a sort of 

 revolution has been effected ; but there now seems 

 to be an accepted opinion among the competitive 

 name-givers — that the appellation conferred must 

 tell a tale of breeding, and reveal something 

 indicative of the paternal and maternal origin, as 

 in such a happy instance as St. Blaise (by Hermit 

 and Fusee). It would be a pity if this opinion 

 and the practice founded upon it were to prevail 

 so far as to rob the * Stud Book's ' index of the 



