PRESIDENT-THE EARL OF CLARENDON. 
109 
ensuing race would be sucb as be could easily carry to victory, and 
be would thus by dishonest means on the part of either his jockey, 
owner, or trainer, have acquired a distinct and an undue advantage 
over the other competitors for the prize. But is this palpable fraud 
in any way to be laid to the horse’s charge ? Does it not, rather, 
raise the blush of shame to the honest cheek that the noble animal 
should be made the passive instrument of sordid malpractices? 
And is it not somewhat anomalous that the generous beast should 
all unwittingly marshal those who have control over him on the 
road to disgrace and ruin ? 
There has been during the past twenty-five years a very noticeable 
decadence of the stamina of the English race-horse, which is- 
nowadays bred with a view to speed rather than endurance. So 
much so, that while there are a number of prizes of enormous value 
for races of less than a mile, there are comparatively few for those 
of over that distance. Experts could easily enumerate the few, the 
very few English horses which are capable of compassing, say, three 
miles, at anything like racing pace, and failings in this respect, just 
in the same way as virtues, are inherited from the sire and the dam. 
Some people hold, and there is doubtless some truth in the conten¬ 
tion, that two-year-old racing has a great deal to do with the 
falling off in what is called “staying” power, for although the 
distance horses of two years old are called upon to cover is never 
more than, and more often not as much as, three-quarters of a mile, 
and that too with feather-weights on their backs, yet it must be 
remembered that these races are run at topmost speed, and that the 
strain is such as often to leave indelible marks upon an undeveloped 
constitution and an immature frame. It may of course be said that 
the world might go round without racing and race-horses, but it is 
from their loins that most of our hunters, carriage-horses, and hacks 
have sprung, and unless these latter could trace their descent from 
some thoroughbred ancestor, they would find but little favour in our 
eyes; for they would be not only destitute of that courage which 
“pur sang ” only gives, but they would also be devoid of that make 
and shape without which it would be impossible for them to 
perform their tasks with ease to themselves or with comfort and 
safety to their masters. At Wentworth, Lord Eitzwilliam’s seat in 
Yorkshire, exists perhaps the chef-d'oeuvre of that king of animal- 
painters—Stubbs. It is a life-size portrait of a horse; and the 
great master was evidently of opinion that his subject was so 
peerless in form, so utterly perfect in proportion, that it would 
