170 HOESE-RACING IN FRANCE 



at Batli, tliOLigh favourite ; unplaced to Pate, Frivolity, 

 and Guy Dayrell for the Two-year-old Stakes at 

 Epsom Summer, but won the Epsom Two-year-old 

 Plate, 8 St. 4 lbs., against Pate, 9 st., and eight others ; 

 unplaced for the New Stakes at Ascot ; and unplaced 

 for the Criterion Stakes at Newmarket, behind Hester, 

 Sunlight, and Kingcraft). Boulogne too, though 

 scarcely a * crack,' defeated Pretender (who had 7 lbs. 

 tlie worse in weight) for the Newmarket Derby. 



We have now reached a very momentous period in 

 the history both of France and of French horse-racing ; 

 we have come to the eve of wdiat Frenchmen call eu- 

 phemistically ' les evenements,' to the memorable year 

 1870, to the time of the march (which never ' came off') 

 ' a Berlin,' to the gatheiing of the war cloud which was 

 soon to burst and to cause the ' decheance ' of Napoleon 

 III. We have already seen how, when the French 

 were ' coming on nicely with their horse -racing,' 

 both in the days when Philippe Egalite ran horses 

 in England and imported English horses into France 

 and when Charles X. and his son, the Dauphin, and 

 Louis Philippe and his son, the Duke d'Orleans, were 

 improving the breed of Franco-English or Anglo-French 

 thoroughbreds by importation and the encouragement 

 of horse-racing, tliere came a revolution or a war or 

 both, which stopped the good work for a longer or 

 shorter while ; and so it was again. The Franco- 

 Prussian war, Avitli a revolution ' to follow ' or to 

 accompany it, once more threw the French back in 

 their horse-breeding and horse-racing, but not nearly 

 so much as heretofore; still quite enough. 'Les 

 evenements,' or apprehension of them, led Count F. de 

 Lagrange to offer his gigantic establishment for sale, so 

 that he miglit be ready for action ; produced what is 



