A Heart to Heart Talk with Breeders 



Now then, if you are a really intelligent breeder you would rather pay out $100 

 for a season's service to a horse tracing back to Boadicea, than to breed her free of 

 charge to a stallion tracing to her full sister, Berenice. People may say "the blood is 

 just the same," but that does not necessarily insure success. In the descendants of this 

 same mare, Boadicea, we find strong enough proof of that for her grandson, Touch- 

 stone, was one of the most successful sires of the century, while his full brother*, 

 Launcelot also a St. Leger winner and as much handsomer horse than Touchstone 

 as one horse could possibly be handsomer than another never got a horse above the 

 grade of a selling plater. I am one of these fellows who is easily scared by the "full 

 brother" dodge. A man, some twelve years ago, brought over a black New Zealand 

 horse called Idalium, full brother to Sir Modred and Cheviot, who had already gotten 

 some good horses in America. The horse was offered to a friend of mine who con- 

 sulted me about him. I told him to let him alone because in the long space of an 

 entire century, there were just two mares that produced three first-class sires. These 

 were the Alexander mare (dam of Selim, Rubens and Castrel), foaled in 1793; and 

 the great Pocahontas (dam of Stockwell, King Tom and Rataplan, ranking as sires 

 in the order named), foaled in 1837. I told him that Idalia had already produced 

 two good sires in Sir Modred and Cheviot ; and that, with the experience of the past 

 century, one could not well look for anything else to equal them from that mare. The 

 horse finally became the property of A. B. Spreckles who, in eight years, wasted a 

 lot of good mares on him without getting as much as a decent selling plater. I there- 

 fore am not easily caught by the "full brother" or "full sister" business. 



The No. 4 family is considerably spread out that's where it differs from the 

 No. 14, which owes all its prestige to Boadicea. There are several branches of the 

 No. 4 family which, to my notion, is stronger in America than in England, for I do 

 not know of any three English sires from it that equal Iroquois, Sir Dixon and Bel- 

 videre. Thormanby was good and Kisber was better, but I know of no other sire of 

 note in this English branch except it be Pizzaro, imported by Mr. Pierre Lorillard ; 

 and he died too young for anybody to form a really correct idea of his powers as a 

 sire. My impression is that he was on the high road to fame when he died. His 

 half-brother, Pontiac, by Pero Gomez, gets a good horse occasionally, Ramapo being 

 the best of his progeny, and he must be at least fourteen years old. Pontiac was the 

 second horse to win the Suburban Handicap at Sheepshead Bay. 



My advice to breeders is -to begin as systematically as they would go into any other 

 kind of business. Lay down certain rules for yourselves and live up to them in a 

 methodical way. The rules I would prescribe for your guidance would be the fol- 

 lowing: 



I. Don't breed your mare to a horse lacking in individuality, no matter how 

 well-bred he may be. 



II. Don't breed your mare to a bad-tempered horse, no matter how good a per- 

 former he may have been. There are "Sulkers" enough in the world already without 

 adding to their number. 



III. In the selection of a stallion always endeavor to breed your mares to one 

 whose female tail-line shows more than one sire produced by those mares. See pedi- 

 grees of Touchstone, Leamington, Reform, and Darebin in America ; and Panic and 

 Grand Flaneur in the Australian Colonies. They all traced to Boadicea. 



IV. Endeavor to breed conversely like the pedigrees of Ayrshire, Sir Modred 

 and Chester, given elsewhere in this book provided the intermediate crosses are 

 quite dissimilar. 



V. If a mare is twelve years old and has had five foals or more, mate her with 

 a stallion from six to eight years old or even five. If she is five or six years old or 

 at any age under twelve, breed her to some old and well-tried horse, from fourteen 

 to twenty years of age. 



