90 JOHN PORTER OF KINGSCLERE 



Ascot, and there, in May, Blue Gown made his 

 first appearance in public. It was a successful 

 outing, for he won the Sunning Hill Stakes 

 over half a mile. Among the horses he defeated 

 was Mr. S. Thellusson*s colt Lictor, already a 

 winner, and presently to become an inmate of 

 the Kingsclere Stable. The fact that on this 

 occasion Blue Gown started an odds-on favourite 

 shows that we were not unaware of his merits. 

 His next race was at Bath. There he was again 

 favourite, but beaten by the Marquis of 

 Hastings' filly. Lady Elizabeth (about whom 

 so much was to be heard in the course of the 

 next few months) and by Mr. Pryor's Grimston. 

 So far as Grimston was concerned, the form was 

 not correct ; when they met again, at Ascot 

 in June, in the Fernhill Stakes, Blue Gown got 

 the better of him. 



That same Ascot week Rosicrucian was 

 ** produced ** to good purpose, for he won a 

 Maiden Plate from twenty-one opponents, start- 

 ing an equal favourite with Sir Frederick 

 Johnstone's Banditto. Rosicrucian's dam was 

 Madame Eglentine, so he was brother to The 

 Palmer. Madame Eglentine was a mare by 

 Cowl, out of Diversion, by Defence, and was 

 bred by Sir Joseph Hawley. Her racing career 

 began and ended during her two-year-old days. 

 She won six of the eleven events in which she 

 ran, the value of the stakes to her credit at 



