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they are carrying their foals, which keeps them in good health and 

 natural condition, which is so essential to the well-being of their 

 progeny. 



As regards rearing our youngsters, be they half or thoroughbred, we 

 never pamper them. Our foals, yearlings, and two-year-olds are, in 

 most instances, well fed and tended, but in all cases they are, more 

 or less, inured to a certain degree of hardship by being left exposed to 

 vicissitudes of weather. This the English thoroughbred is never 

 allowed to experience. 



I was lately at a select but small breeding establishment in Wales. 

 The weather had been fine for some time, but a shower happened to 

 fall during my visit. Never did I see more energy exhibited than by 

 the stud-groom hurrying off a number of stable-boys to get the year- 

 lings under cover ! If these pampered pets had been in Ireland they 

 would have been left where they were, even if snow, instead of rain, had 

 been falling on their precious bodies. 



I am not for a moment going to suggest that our trainers are more 

 sagacious than the English ; but it is a fact that when they send 

 horses to England to run, they nearly always give a good account of 

 themselves, more particularly at jump-race meetings. 



As I said before, explain I cannot the superiority of our Irish bred and 

 eared horses to those of practically the same strains bred and reared in 

 England — it is an undeniable fact. Perhaps it is that we rear ours 

 hardier, upon a better soil, and in a better climate ; or, perhaps, our 

 trainers do know a bit more about making the best out of their few horses 

 than do our neighbours out of the great number they have. Again, perhaps 

 the hardy rearing to which we subject our youngsters kills off the 

 weakly ones, leaving none but the sound and strong. Just as the 

 children seen running about the slums in a half-naked state, living in 

 filth and half-starved, nearly always appear to be healthy, hardy, and 

 happy, simply because all the delicate ones have died. 



One thing we certainly do not do, and that is we do not bring our 

 horses to the post with that beautiful po ish on their coats which the 

 English horses generally have. At the same time ours are just as 

 iit to go. 



I do know, however, that the class of race and steeplechase horse we 

 h&d in Ireland twenty years ago was better and, as a rule, up to 

 more weight than what we have now, even though the number be 

 greater. Of course we can name only comparatively few, because the 

 whole lot was few. But those were toppers, and with some of our 

 old Racing Calendars before me, I can pick out scores of horses of 

 the highest class which ran in Ireland in the forties, fifties, sixties, 

 and seventies. But to give a list of them might not be interesting, 

 nor would it prove my case. 



What a paradox is handicapping, and how unjust is the idea ! We 

 strive to produce good horses, and as soon as one has proved himself 

 to be better than another, weight is put upon him to bring him back 



