'The Australian 'Thoroughbred //./ 



deal the best son of Maxim, who, to borrow the language of Henry the Eighth, 

 "should have died hereafter.'' I once asked Tom Payten, by far the best trainer I 

 met in Australia, what was the hardest race the great Abercorn ever won. He an- 

 swered without a moment's hesitation, "The race where he beat Maxim when they 

 were two years old." Such an opinion and from such a source was worthy of recol- 

 lection. 



Kelpie, the sire of Fireworks, who was a great performer and the only horse in 

 all Australian history to win three Derbys, was imported from England and was a full 

 brother to Diomedia, the second dam of Trappist, sire of 1'Abbesse de Jouarre. He is 

 described to me as an enormous red chestnut, standing sixteen hands, three inches 

 high and dividing with Talk o' the Hill, the honor of being the largest and best boned 

 stallion imported since the discovery of gold. He stood over a great deal of ground 

 and measured over nine inches around his cannon bones. He was kept near Albury, 

 on the Murray rLver, for some time, where his fee was only 7.10, but after Fisherman 

 died (to whom Gas Light had produced a winner of the Champion race, 3 miles) the 

 mare was sent to Kelpie and the result was Fireworks, who was, Bruce Lowe told me, 

 the handsomest horse he ever saw. Nothing could surpass the sculptured beauty of his 

 head and neck, nor the lofty carriage with which he paraded himself both in training 

 and in the stud. He died very young which was a great misfortune for, as an ex- 

 ponent of the line of Tramp, he must have been nearly as good as Lanercost or Rosi- 

 crucian, and better than anything else descended from the loins of the great Bishop 

 Burton horse that was the first three-year-old to win the once dearly-prized Doncaster 

 Cup. 



NECKERSGAT fills such an important place in Australian pedigrees that I feel he 

 deserves some mention here, particularly as he was one of the first ten stallions on the 

 list for no less than twelve years. He was nearly as large a horse as Kelpie and a great 

 deal coarser and, in my belief the best stallion that ever descended from the male line 

 of that hardluck horse, Ion, by Cain, who ran second in the Derby to the worthless 

 Amato and second in the St. Leger to Don John, of whom I speak in another part of, 

 this book, devoted to American horses. A Mr. Gerrard, of South Australia, sent to 

 England for a big horse he wanted to breed hunters for that beautiful country around 

 Adelaide. The horse that came out for him was Talk o' the Hill, a total failure as a 

 race horse but a magnificent individual, said to be the biggest horse that ever crossed 

 the equator for he stood seventeen hands barefooted and girthed seven feet two and 

 one-half inches. His bone was in proportion to his size. Now, then, "take hoff 

 yer 'at." He was by Wild Dayrell (Derby of 1855) out of Ayacanora by Birdcatcher, 

 from Pocahontas (dam of Stockwell, Rataplan and King Tom) by Glencoe. Noth- 

 ing could be more finely bred for while Wild Dayrell the most beautiful horse of 

 his day was no great success as a sire, he got Buccaneer, the best Herod line stallion 

 of the past seventy years, barring Lexington in America. There was no horse of 

 Buccaneer's day that got any such horse as Kisber or such a filly as Formosa. 



About the same time Talk o' the Hill came out, a mare was brought to Adelaide 

 called Miss Giraffe. She was by King Tom, out of Giraffe by Melbourne, from Molly 

 by Pantaloon, from Industry (Oaks winner of 1838 and dam of Lady Evelyn, Oaks of 

 1849) by Priam. This mare's first produce to Talk o' the Hill was Neckersgat, as 

 coarse a horse as ever was seen. He met with an accident as a yearling and was 

 never trained. He was an awkward looking chestnut and his dam had evidently bred 

 back to Harkaway. Next year she produced a colt with quality (enough for 

 Wild Dayrell or Flying Dutchman), being a beautiful and bloodlike bay with 

 white heels behind and just enough white in his face to light up as intelligent a head 

 as ever was put upon a horse. Near where he was foaled is a small harbor full of 

 tide-rips called Rapid Bay and that was the name bestowed upon him by his owner, 

 Sir Thomas Elder of Morphettville, the handsomest stud farm in all that country 



