548 HORSE BUYING AND BREEDING IN SOUTH AFRICA. 
This contract was given to Mr. L. E. B. Homan, formerly of Johan¬ 
nesburg and now of South Africa generally in any part of which 
“ Lieutenant ” Homan knows, and is known by more men of all sorts 
and conditions, than perhaps any other man in the Colony. He is a 
type you only meet in new countries. A cheery good sportsman, a 
gentleman and English public School-boy, he started at Kimberley as 
a lad of 19, keeping books in a store. It was at the time of the first 
Kimberley boom when speculation in the diamond city was as active 
as it is now in Johannesburg and the young book-keeper blossomed 
forth into an owner of a race-horse. His employer not sympathising 
with these sporting proclivities it became a question of breaking up the 
stable or accepting the sack, and Homan chose the latter, since then 
he has speculated, farmed, raced and hunted the Johannesburg fox¬ 
hounds (until the Boers poisoned three couple of them) and has run 
through two or three useful fortunes without anyone having, to my 
knowledge, a word to say against his character as a good fellow, or an 
honlest gentleman, and this is no slight praise to a man who has specu¬ 
lated on the South African Markets and raced on the South African 
turf. Our relations with him were most friendly and pleasant, we 
showed him absolutely no favour, and rejected his horses pretty free¬ 
ly, especially at first before he and his agents tumbled to what we 
wanted, but he was always perfectly good humoured over it, even when 
I expect he thought we were a little bit rough on his animals. He 
was an indefatigable worker, and spared no personal trouble or ex¬ 
pense, to perform his contract up to time, which was by no means the 
case with other contractors, with whom we had dealings. Eventually 
he received the contract for nearly 800 of these animals, and I think, 
considering the price, did us very well. He assured me, and I quite 
believe him, that his net profit over this contract was 12%, which an 
ordinary business man, considering the risky nature of the goods, would 
consider but a poor turnover. 
Now taking the general question of purchasing horses in a colony 
like South Africa, you can either buy straight from the farmer or em¬ 
ploy an agent. It is needless to say that if you have unlimited time 
at your disposal, do not require a great number of animals and know 
the country thoroughly well, the former method is the cheapest, but it 
is out of the question when, as in our case, time is of great consequence 
and a large number of horses are required for a special purpose. The 
horses have to be bought originally from the farmer himself, on the 
farm, which means many hours drive and considerable discomfort to 
get perhaps one horse. The Dutch farmer will generally sell you his 
horse as a» mount on which to fight his own brother, if he can get a 
sufficient price for him, but he will not bring him any distance for you 
to see, and if a remount officer advertised for horses to be brought to 
a certain place for his inspection on a certain day he might sit and 
whistle for the horses unless some enterprising agent had taken the 
matter in hand. If it is decided then to employ a contractor, my opin¬ 
ion (in South Africa at least) is that it is better business for government 
to give the work to one man. I should of course only give him quite 
