•THE AMERICAN YEAR/ 1881. 



The racing sensations of 1881 wore the victories in 

 the Derby and St. Leger of Mr. Lorii lard's horse, 

 Iroquois, and the winning of the double event — 

 Cesarewitch and Cambridgeshire - by Mr. Keene's 

 Foxhall. After these events had taken place, sporting 

 writers began to speak of the 'American year,' and 

 sporting journals became filled with gossip incidental 

 to the subject. 



Mr. Lorillard, the owner of Iroquois, was of course 

 ' biographied,' interviewed, and described ; his trainer, 

 Jacob Pincus, was written about till the subject be- 

 came quite stale. The pedigrees of the winning 

 liorses were traced, the system of preparation adopted 

 by American trainers was compared with our system, 

 and when these topics were exhausted, ' the American 

 plunger ' was set upon, and his doings on our race- 

 courses remorselessly chronicled and commented upon. 

 Turf-writers, although they adaiitted our best horses 

 had ' gone down like ninepins before the representa- 

 tive animals of the great Transatlantic Republic,' were 

 fain to take refutre in the excuse that the English 

 race-horses, which competed in the American year as 

 three year- olds, were a ' very moderate lot,' and, in 



