RUSHING ON THE ROAD 



towards what I had just left. I had more chances of 

 social life in London ; there seemed a sort of domestic 

 touch even about a rubber of bridge in a private room 

 at an hotel. I used to be asked out a good deal ; it 

 gave quite a change to the daily life. Of course I had 

 a lot of old friends in New York who would offer me 

 the same hospitality, but it was what I had just 

 become accustomed to which I hankered after. 



Then again, the theatres didn't seem quite so com- 

 fortable. Going out to the play in London was more 

 like going to a party. Everyone looked so well turned 

 out and I used to enjoy the intervals between the acts 

 when we could talk over different things, and I had 

 time to smoke quite a quarter of a cigar in the lobby. 

 The plays were better, or appealed to me more, in 

 New York, but the whole surroundings of the theatre 

 were more attractive in the London I had just left. 



On the other hand there were many things in 

 England that I could have done without, as I discovered 

 when I got back. Rushing about all over the country 

 for instance for three days or two days here, and 

 another day or two there. It seemed to be like being 

 " on the road " in a one-night-stand company. All 

 American trainers who have settled in England have 

 disliked this. It is so different from America where 

 one races two or three weeks at one place and then 

 moves on to another. At Saratoga for instance they 

 raced continuously for nearly three weeks, and in the 

 good times many horses were trained with the others 

 of the string which perhaps were not intended to be 

 run at that meeting at all. 



Other Americans' experiences have been very similar 

 to mine — the longing to rush back " home," a mild 

 desire to come to Europe again and then a great 

 regret to leave England or France, and then, eventu- 



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