14 HORSE -RAGING IN FRANCE 



caused it to be introduced as the most becoming manner of 

 riding for women. Thus mounted, they travel long journeys at 

 a smart trot. 



' They seldom or never strike them ' is good, very 

 good ; Mirabeau had evidently never heard of Mr. 

 William Glift (born in 1763) and other jockeys of the 

 ' old school ' who are said to have had ' heavy punish- 

 ment ' for their only creed. 



But let us get on to the First Empire, when horse- 

 racing in France was not much better than before. 

 Napoleon the Great certainly said, in his omnipotent 

 way, ' Let there be races,' and there were races, chiefly 

 in the Department of the Orne, with a ' hippodrome ' at 

 Le Pin, where is the ' haras ' founded by Colbert at the 

 time of establishing the Administration des Haras ; but 

 the racing was of no account as sport, or as a national 

 institution, or as an aid towards the improvement of 

 Frencli horseflesh by propagation of the Anglo-Arabian 

 breed. It may have had some good influence upon the 

 horses of the French cavalry, and that is all that Na- 

 poleon would have cared about ; just as, probably, it 

 was all that William the ' Dutchman ' cared about 

 Avhen he bestowed no little patronage on Newmarket 

 and the ' sport of kings.' 



At the Eestoration and the return of the Count 

 d'Artois it may be supposed that there would have been 

 a recurrence of old times, with another Comus, another 

 King Pepin, and so on ; but Humpty Dumpty is not 

 easily set up again after a fall. However there were 

 siccus of what was soon to come both in breedinf^ and 

 in racing, as may be seen at a glance from looking at 

 the early numbers of the ' Journal des Haras,' which 

 was published for the first time in 1828. Not only was 

 there the Dauphin's stud at Meudon (where Eowlston 



