FOURTH PERIOD: VICTORIA 267 



lings. Never were there so many owners, breeders, 

 and runners of race-horses ; never so many horses 

 to run, never so many thousands of pounds in 

 ' public money ' to be won upon the turf. The 

 question is whether this is likely to continue. Let 

 us consult the instructive statistics collected by a 

 gentleman who writes in the Illustrated Sporting 

 and Dramatic News in the noni de gtterre of 

 ' Rapier.' According to his calculations, then, in 

 1892, 2,559 horses ran flat-races for ^486,556 

 (and a few shillings), which sum was won by 947 

 competitors, leaving 1,612 to go empty away, 

 without winning a single race, though many of 

 them ran many times. Of the ' monster prizes,' 

 moreover, the Eclipse Stakes (which has already 

 twice fallen through) has decreased in value from 

 ^11,165 in 1889 to ;^9,405 ; the Lancashire Plate 

 from ^10,131 to ^7,930 ; the Kempton Park 

 Great Breeders' Foal Stakes from ^6,177 to 

 ;^4,937 (and even some ^600 less in 1891) ; the 

 Newmarket Stakes (a newly subsidized affair) 

 from ^6,000 to ^3,795 ; the Whitsuntide Plate 

 (now Stakes) from ^3,400 to ^1,194; ^^^^ the 

 Prince of Wales's Stakes (now Plate) at Leicester 

 from ^11,000 to {})£(^2j. At the same time 



