'The American 'Thoroughbred 109 



ficient in speed, gave Sue Vvashington and Nicholas the First the races of their lives. 

 Yorkshire was a different proposition. He won at mile heats on Tuesday and two 

 mile heats on Thursday and because he could not beat George Burbridge at three 

 mile heats the next Saturday, his owner (Com. Morgan, U. S. N.,) presented him to 

 Hon. Henry Clay, whose son, the late John M. Clay, bred scores of good winners 

 from him. Yorkshire never got a sire worthy of mention, nor did any of his sons 

 run well at five or six years old. His daughters bred well to everything; and one 

 of them, Bay Leaf, was the only American mare, up to 1890, that had dropped. three 

 horses to win races in England Preakness, Rubicon and Bay Final. The Yorkshire 

 mares bred exceptionally well to Lexington and another great descendant of Bay 

 Leaf was that splendid racer and capital sire, Bramble. 



IMPORTED SCYTHIAN, who won the Chester cup of 1854, was as bad a failure as 

 could have been expected from as well-bred a horse as he was. By Orlando (Derby 

 of 1844), out of a mare by Hetman Platoff (sire of a Derby winner), and her dam 

 the Oaks winner, Princess, one would have said "Seek no further," but he only got 

 two really good ones Sympathy and Lizzie W. full sisters and great winners in 

 1864. I saw Scythian shortly after his arrival and he did no^ please me. He had 

 good shoulders and grand quarters, two galloping ends stuck together with a very 

 poor middle piece. He was a very costly purchase for Mr. Robert Alexander. 



Two sons of the great Isonomy have been imported to America Hermence and 

 Water Level, the latter of whom is something of a disappointment. Hermence, since 

 he passed into the possession of Mr. O. H. Chenault, of Lexington, seems to have 

 made a marked improvement in himself. He got that deservedly great little horse, 

 Hermis, whose dam is Katy of the West, going back to Chloe Anderson, the great 

 grand dam of the great three-miler Norfolk, whose record made thirty-nine years ago, 

 is still unbeaten. Hermis has won many a good race, his three best performances 

 being the Brighton Cup of 1903 in the second best time recorded; the Suburban of the 

 present year in the second best record for that race and the best when the weights 

 are considered ; and the Test Handicap at Brighton Beach, in which he covered a 

 mile in 1 138 with 133 pounds, beating that great filly Beldame, conceding thirty 

 pounds to that good filly Dainty, who finished third. Hermence is one of the best 

 horses on earth and was imported by William Astor of New York. He is out of 

 the Oaks winner Thebais, by Hermit from Devotion by Stockwell, thus being in-bred 

 to that greatest of all English sires. 



MARTENHURST ran third in the Derby of 1891, won by Common with Gouverneur 

 second ; and was imported into America in the fall of 1892, by Mr. Simeon G. Reed 

 of Pasadena, at a cost of about $13,000 up to the time he landed in California. He 

 made the season of 1893 at the Rancho del Paso and died at Los Angeles of pneu- 

 monia, as the. result of a cold contracted on a train while crossing the Tehachapi 

 mountains. I do not claim that he was the superior of St. Blaise, Mr. Pickwick, 

 Eothen or Deceiver, among the Touchstone horses imported into this country, but he 

 had certainly a chance to become so, had he lived. Martenhurst, at the Rancho del 

 Paso, served fifteen of Mr. Haggin's mares, getting thirteen foals, one of which got 

 crippled and was therefore never trained. Of the remainder, each one became a 

 winner of at least one race in good company ; and several of his get exhibited genu- 

 ine stake form. His death weighed heavily upon his owner, an enterprising and 

 large-hearted man in whose employ I had the honor to be during my days as a steam- 

 boat officer. Mr. Reed imported an Irish horse called Duncombe to take Marten- 

 hurst's place, but, while he was fairly good, he achieved no such results as could 

 have been reasonably expected from the great bay son of Wenlock, had he lived. 

 Martenhurst's dam was Hirondelle (sister to Josyan) by Adventurer, out of Lady 

 Langden by Kettledrum, she being the dam of the Derby winner, Sir Bevys, and of 



