THE TURF AND THE TROTTING HORSE. 555 



APPENDIX. 



THE position of the turf in America, despite the prejudices 

 and practices which tend to make it disreputable, was never so 

 high as at present. There is throughout the country an interest 

 excited in the sport among a class of citizens who have hitherto 

 held entirely aloof from it. This is undoubtedly owing to the ex- 

 ample of Mr. Robert Bonner and a few other gentlemen, who have 

 had the moral courage to withstand the wholly unreasonable popu- 

 lar prejudice against owning and driving fast horses ; and hence 

 the growth and extension of the practice of fast driving for plea- 

 sure. In another place we endeavored to show the real adaptation 

 of this pastime to the taste, disposition, and occupation of our 

 American people, who require an outdoor sport that does not ne- 

 cessitate much physical exertion. This want is met by driving; 

 and racing is its legitimate adjunct. The turf has reaped its ad- 

 vantage in this new and general interest in the horse, both in its 

 revival on a far grander scale, and in a truly moral and healthy 

 system of management. The rapidly increasing wealth of the 

 country, and the consequent increase in the price of luxuries so 

 rare and highly prized, has encouraged the breeding of fine horses, 

 and we now have stock-farms that a few years ago would have 

 placed their owners, no matter how situated, upon the sure road 

 to bankruptcy. These great nurseries are not confined to one 

 state, but are scattered over the whole Union, and they are now 

 bringing forth hundreds of speedy horses, and promise, -ere long, 

 a rival of Dexter. From Stony Ford, the splendid establishment 

 of Mr. Charles Backman, we have the young horse Startle, who 

 had hardly made his appearance when he was caught up by Mr. 

 Bonner. The habit of buying up promising young horses and 

 withdrawing them from the turf on the part of Mr. Bonner. is re- 

 sented by some persons professionally interested in the turf; but 

 whatever their views may be, people in general will be disposed to 

 consider that a horse is put to quite as good a purpose when he is 

 trotted for pleasure as when he is trotted for money. As another 

 has noted, the certainty of obtaining such a price as was paid for 

 Startle, for every horse that performs an equal feat at an equal 

 age, will go much further towards improving the breed of horses 

 for uses undeniably legitimate, than the chance of winning un- 

 known sums by uses of questionable legitimacy. 



During the past two or three years we have had an unparalleled 

 increase in the number of fast trotting horses. Since the first 

 publication of the paper of which these pages are a postscript, 

 there have appeared horses, then but just born, which are already 



