Horses Past and Present

In Scotland it would appear that betting on races was carried on to an extent that called for legislative interference; for in 1621 the Parliament at Edinburgh passed an Act which required any man who might win over 100 marks in twenty-four hours “at cards, dice, or wagering on horse races,” to make over the surplus to the kirk for the benefit of the poor.

Apart from the fostering care James I. bestowed upon the Turf, the only proceedings that require mention are: his Proclamation issued in 1608, which notified that the laws against the export of horses were not being obeyed, and would thenceforward be enforced; and his repeal in 1624 of Henry VIII.’s law obliging every person whose wife wore “any French hood or bonnet of velvet” to keep a stallion. He also repealed 32 Henry VIII., so far as it applied to Cornwall (21 Jac. I., c. 28), even as Queen Elizabeth had relieved some Eastern and Midland counties from operation of that law, in view of their unsuitability to breed heavy horses.

CHARLES I. (1625, Behd. 1649).

Charles I. inherited, to some extent, his father’s taste for the Turf, and combined therewith a love of the manége, due to his own accomplished horsemanship. The interest in racing was now so general, and the inducement to breed light and swift horses for the purpose so great, that other classes of horse were neglected, to the alarm of the more far-seeing among the King’s subjects. So seriously was the tendency to breed only light horses regarded, that Sir Edward Harwood presented a memorial to Charles, in which it was pointed out that there was a great deficiency in the kingdom of horses of a useful type, and praying that steps should be taken to encourage the breeding of horses for service, and racing discouraged. Charles would seem to have been conscious that excessive attention to breeding light horses was a national question; at all events, that animals of a more generally useful stamp were scarce; for in 1641 he granted licenses for the importation of horses, enjoining the licensees to import coach horses, mares, and geldings not under 14 hands, and between the ages of three and seven years.

In November, 1627, Charles issued his Proclamation forbidding the use of snaffles, except for hunting and hawking (“in times of Disport”), and requiring all riders to use bits. His motive was, no doubt, a desire to encourage the manége, which was then considered the highest form of horsemanship. The King and the Queen had separate establishments, and each kept a large number of horses, including racehorses. The English system of stable management had made such advances at this time that Marshal Bassompierre, the French Ambassador in London, refers to it in his memoirs, and recommends that English methods be followed in France. The same writer speaks, too, of the superiority of English horses.

The hackney-coach question came up again in this reign, and Charles issued a Proclamation dealing with the subject in January, 1636. He forbade the use of coaches in London and Westminster unless they were about to make a journey of at least three miles; and he required every owner of a coach to keep four horses for the King’s service. We may conjecture that his prohibition of hackney coaches was not the outcome of a desire to encourage horsemanship; for about eighteen months later he granted to his Master of the Horse, James, Marquis of Hamilton, power to license fifty hackney coachmen in London and the suburbs and convenient places in other parts of the realm. This license, granted by Proclamation in July, 1637, suggests favouritism, as according to a contemporary publication[10] there were in 1636 over 6,000 coaches, private and public, in London and the suburbs: surely more than were needed, as some 10,000 odd hansoms and four-wheelers meet London’s normal requirements to-day.

Thomas D’Urfey’s song,[11] “Newmarket,” which is thought to have been written in the reign of Charles I., shows that Newmarket was then, as now, regarded as the headquarters of the Turf.

THE COMMONWEALTH (1649-1659).

Mr. Christie Whyte, in his History of the English Turf, says:—“Oliver Cromwell, with his accustomed sagacity, perceiving the vast benefit derived to the nation by the improvement of its breed of horses, the natural consequence of racing, patronised this peculiarly national amusement, and we find accordingly that he kept a racing stud.” If Cromwell kept a racing stable it was before he took the style of “Lord Protector,” in December, 1653; for in February, 1654, he issued his first Proclamation against racing, in the shape of a prohibition for six months, which prohibition was repeated in July. In subsequent years, by the same means, he made racing, cock-fighting, bear-baiting, and gambling, illegal.

Owing what he did to his cavalry, it was only to be expected that he should devote attention to the matter of remounts. He imported many Arabs, Barbs, and other horses suitable for the lightly armoured troops which had now replaced the knighthood of former days; he also took measures to encourage the breeding of horses for hunting and hawking, sports in which he himself indulged.

At what date stage-coaches began to supersede the old waggons, which (apart from saddle and pack horses) were the only means of journeying in England in Queen Elizabeth’s time, is not known. In the year 1610, a Pomeranian speculator was granted a royal patent for fifteen years to run coaches and waggons between Edinburgh and Leith;[12] but not until the end of the Commonwealth (May, 1659) do we find definite mention of a stage coach in England in the diary of a Yorkshire clergyman.[13] This diary shows that stage coaches and waggons were then plying between London and Coventry, London and Aylesbury, London and Bedford, and on other roads.

It is highly improbable that there existed any horses of the coaching stamp at this period; on the contrary, the wretched condition of the roads until late in the eighteenth century,[14] and the time occupied on a journey, indicates that animals of the Great Horse breed were used to drag the ponderous vehicles through the mud.

CHARLES II. (1660-1685).

After the gloom of the Commonwealth the nation was ripe for such changes in its social life as came in with the Restoration. Newmarket, which had been deserted during the civil war and the rule of Cromwell, recovered its former position as the headquarters of racing under the patronage of Charles II. The King entered his horses in his own name, and came to see them run, residing at the King’s House when he visited Newmarket. He did away with the bell as a prize, substituting a bowl or cup of the value of a hundred guineas, upon which the name and pedigree of the winner was engraved. He also devoted considerable attention to improving the English racehorse; he sent his Master of Horse abroad to purchase stallions and brood mares, principally Arabs, Barbs and Turkish horses. To these “King’s mares,” as they were entitled, our modern racehorse traces his descent on the dam’s side.

Charles II.’s love of racing was not satisfied by the meetings at Newmarket, which was not readily accessible from Windsor, and he instituted races on Datchet Mead, within sight of the castle, across the Thames. Here, as at Newmarket, he encouraged the sport by the presentation of cups and bowls. Burford Races owed the prestige they long enjoyed to the encouragement of Charles II. in 1681. Political considerations required that public attention should be diverted for the time, if possible, and to secure this end Charles had all his best horses brought from Newmarket for the occasion.

The only piece of legislation that demands notice is the repeal of the laws against export, which had been on the Statute Book since Henry VII.’s reign. The prohibition was cancelled and a duty of 5s. per head imposed on every horse sent over sea.

As proving the wide interest now taken in racing, the publication in 1680 of a curious little book called The Compleat Gamester, may be mentioned. This gives very full and minute instructions for the preparation and training of racehorses.

Stage coaches and waggons increased in number during Charles II.’s reign. There is among the Harleian Miscellany (vol. viii.) a tract dated 1673, in which the writer adduces several reasons for the suppression of coaches, “especially those within 40, 50, or 60 miles off London.” His first reason for objecting to the coach is that it works harm to the nation “by destroying the breed of good horses, the strength of the nation, and making men careless of attaining to good horsemanship, a thing so useful and commendable in a gentleman.” Charles apparently did not share this opinion; at all events, he gave countenance to the coach-building industry by founding, in 1677, the Company of Coach and Coach Harness Makers.[15]

We may pass over the brief reign of James II. (1685-1688), as it was marked by nothing of importance bearing on our subject.

WILLIAM III. (1689-1702).

The first year of this reign saw the importation of the first of the Eastern sires which contributed to found the modern breed of racehorses—the Byerley Turk. The Oglethorpe Arabian arrived about the same time. The Turf was growing in importance and popularity; and we find that a gold bowl was one of the prizes offered at the Newmarket meeting of 1689. King William took personal interest in racing, and kept a stud under the charge of the famous Tregonwell Frampton, who filled the office of Keeper of the Running Horses under Queen Anne, George I. and George II. The King seems often to have visited Newmarket, and he encouraged other meetings—Burford, for example—by his presence.

He was keenly alive to the importance of encouraging horsemanship; sharing, perhaps, the view held by many persons at this period that the general use of stage coaches and carriages was likely to lead to loss of proficiency in the saddle. He established a riding school, placing in charge Major Foubert, a French officer, whom he invited to England for the purpose. At the same time he recognised that travelling on wheels would increase in popularity, and took such measures as he might to prevent the breed of horses from degenerating. His Act of 1694 (5 and 6 Wm. and M., c. 22), granting licenses to 700 hackney coaches, four-wheel carriages, now called cabs, in London and Westminster, contains a clause forbidding the use of any horse, gelding or mare under 14 hands in hackney or stage coach.

The increasing numbers of people who travelled by stage coach had brought the highwayman into flourishing existence, and 4 of Wm. and M. c. 8, to encourage the apprehension of these gentry, gave the taker of a highwayman the horse, arms, and other property of the thief. In the tenth year of his reign another Act was passed (10 Wm. III., c. 12) which made horse stealers liable to the penalty of branding on the cheek; this enactment, however, was repealed in 1706 by Queen Anne (6 Anne, 9), who substituted burning in the hand for a penalty which declared the sufferer’s character to all who saw him.

William, by legislation, endeavoured to procure improvements in the public highways, whose condition in many parts had become dangerous “by reason of the great and many loads which are weekly drawn through the same.” The records of subsequent years, however, showed that the state of the roads continued to leave much to be desired.

QUEEN ANNE (1702-1714).

The arrival in England of the Darley Arabian in 1706 was a fit opening of the era of prosperity on the Turf which dawned in Anne’s time. The Queen, from the beginning of her reign, evinced her desire to promote racing, and added several royal plates to those already in existence—at the instance, says Berenger,[16] of her consort, Prince George of Denmark, who is said to have been exceedingly fond of the Turf. A writer in the Sporting Magazine of 1810 gives the following account of the circumstances under which the royal plates were given:—

“... Gentlemen went on breeding their horses so fine for the sake of shape and speed only. Those animals which were only second, third or fourth rates in speed were considered to be quite useless. This custom continued until the reign of Queen Anne, when a public spirited gentleman (observing inconvenience arising from this exclusiveness) left thirteen plates or purses to be run for at such places as the Crown should appoint. Hence they are called the King’s or Queen’s Plates or Guineas. They were given upon the condition that each horse, mare or gelding should carry twelve stone weight, the best of three heats over a four-mile course. By this method a stronger and more useful breed was soon raised; and if the horse did not win the guineas, he was yet strong enough to make a good hunter. By these crossings—as the jockeys term it—we have horses of full blood, three-quarters blood, or half bred, suitable to carry burthens; by which means the English breed of horses is allowed to be the best and is greatly esteemed by foreigners.”

Whether the money for the royal plates was provided, as Berenger states, from the Queen’s own purse, at the instance of her consort, or whether it came from the estate of the public spirited gentleman referred to by the contributor to the Sporting Magazine, the fact remains that these plates were established in Anne’s reign, and that they did something to encourage the production of a better stamp of horse. An animal able to carry twelve stone three four-mile heats must be one of substance, and not merely a racing machine.

Much attention would seem to have been given to the mounting of our cavalry and the general efficiency of that arm by Anne’s generals. Col. Geo. Denison, in his History of Cavalry (London, 1877), says that the battle of Blenheim in 1704 was almost altogether decided by the judicious use of cavalry, while at Ramillies in 1706, and Malplaquet, the cavalry played a very important part in the operations.

In the later years of her reign the Queen’s interest in racing became still more apparent; she gave her first Royal gold cup, value 60 guineas, in 1710; and yet more plates: further, she ran horses in her own name at York and elsewhere.

There was little change on the “Road” during Anne’s time; springs of steel had replaced the leather straps used in England until about 1700, but the coaches, improved in minor details, were still ponderous and required powerful teams to draw them. The Queen’s own state coach was drawn by six mares of the Great Horse, or as it should be called in connection with the period under survey, the Shire Horse breed. Oxen were used in the slow stage waggons, as appears from the laws passed by William III. and Anne. The law of the latter sovereign (6 Anne, cap. 56) enacted that not more than six horses or oxen might be harnessed to any vehicle plying on the public roads except to drag them up hills; and this latter indulgence was withdrawn three years later (1710), leaving the team of six to negotiate hills as they might. Hackney coachmen evidently displayed a tendency to evade their legal obligations in the matter of size in their horses; for in 1710 another Act (9 Anne, c. 16) was passed to the same effect as a former law, requiring hackney-coach horses to be not less than 14 hands in height.

GEORGE I. (1714-1727).

During the first seventy years of the eighteenth century Eastern horses were imported in large numbers; there is in existence a list of 200 stallions which were sent to this country, but that number does not represent a tithe of the whole. The event of George I.’s reign, from a Turf point of view, was, of course, the arrival, in 1724, of the Godolphin Arabian, the sire to which our racers of to-day owe so much. George I. appears to have taken little personal interest in the Turf, though at least one visit paid by him to Newmarket, in October 1717, is recorded; nor does the parliamentary history of his brief reign show that much attention was given to the work of improving our horses.

The science of travel had gone back rather than forward, for in 1715 the post from London to Edinburgh took six days, whereas in 1635 it took three. At this time, and until 1784, the mails were carried by boys on horseback; and between the badness of the roads, the untrustworthiness of the boys, and the wretched quality of the horses supplied them, the postal service was both slow and uncertain. The Post Office still held the monopoly (first granted in 1603) of furnishing post-horses at a rate of threepence a mile, and its control over its subordinates was of the slightest.

The only Act of George I.’s reign relating to horses was that of 1714 (1 George I., c. 11), which forbade waggoners, carriers, and others, from drawing any vehicle “with more than four horses in length.”

The omission of reference to oxen in this connection may indicate that for draught purposes on the highways they were going out of use.

GEORGE II. (1727-1760).

An important step was taken in regard to the Turf by George II. in 1740; some of its provisions will be found in Ponies Past and Present (pp. 8 and 9), but it contained other clauses of a far-reaching character. This law (13 Geo. II., c. 19) provided that every horse entered for a race must be bonâ fide the property of the person entering it, and that one person might enter only one horse for a race on pain of forfeiture. The weights to be carried were prescribed:

Any horse carrying less was to be forfeited and his owner fined £200. Every race was to be finished on the day it began, that is to say, all heats were to be run off in one day. The Act went even further. It declared that matches might be run for a stake of under £50, only at Newmarket and Black Hambleton in Yorkshire, under a penalty of £200 for disobedience. Prizes elsewhere were to be of an intrinsic value of at least £50, and entrance money was to go to the second horse.

So drastic a measure as this could not long be upheld in a free and sport-loving country; and it is without surprise we find the Government, five years later, withdrawing from a position which must have made it excessively unpopular. The next law (18 Geo. II., c. 34, sec. xi.) opens with the announcement that, whereas the thirteen Royal Plates of 100 guineas value each, annually run for, as also the high prices that are continually given for horses of strength and size are sufficient to encourage breeders to raise their cattle (sic) to the utmost size and strength possible, “Therefore it shall be lawful to run any match for a stake of not less than £50 value at any weights whatsoever and at any place or places whatsoever.”

The effect of this “climbing down” measure was naturally to introduce lighter weights. Thus in 1754, to take an example that presents itself, Mr. Fenwick’s Match’em won the Ladies’ Plate of 126 guineas at York carrying nine stone, as a five-year-old; six-year-olds carrying 10 stone, four-mile heats; and in 1755 Match’em beat Trajan at Newmarket carrying 8 stone 7 lbs. Perhaps it is not too much to say that the Act of 1745 was the first step towards modern light-weight racing. It must be added that the scale of weights prescribed for the Royal Plates was as follows:—

Races decided in 4-mile heats.

The King himself lent a somewhat perfunctory support to the Turf, keeping at Hampton Court a grey Arab stallion, whose services were available for mares at a stated fee.

A most important event in the history of the Turf marks George II.’s reign. The Jockey Club was founded, and its existence first received public recognition in Mr. John Pond’s Sporting Kalendar, published at the end of 1751 or the beginning of 1752. It is probable, however, that the club was actually in existence in the year 1750; but it was started without any attempt at publicity, and, so far as can be ascertained, with no idea whatever of acquiring the despotic power which eventually came into its hands. As Mr. Robert Black, in The Jockey Club and its Founders, remarks:

“What more natural than that the noblemen and gentlemen who frequented Newmarket, where ruffians and blacklegs were wont to congregate, should conceive the notion of forming themselves into a body apart, so that they might have at Newmarket as well as in London and elsewhere a place of their own, to which not every blackguard who could pay a certain sum of money would have as much right as they to claim entrance.”

The conjecture is a most plausible one; but it was not long before the Club showed that it intended to support racing in practical fashion, for at the Newmarket meeting in May, 1753, two Jockey Club Plates were given for horses belonging to members of the Club.

It is stated that, in the year 1752, sixty thoroughbred stallions, of which only eight were reputed imported Arabs, were standing for service in various parts of England; fees, as may be supposed, were low. A horse named Oronooka headed the list at a fee of 20 guineas; another, Bolton Starling, covered at 8½ guineas; but the usual charge was one, two or three guineas. Flying Childers in the earlier part of the century stood at 50 guineas, then at 100 guineas, and one season at 200 guineas.

There is little to note concerning the “Road” or other spheres of equine work during this reign. The roads were as bad as ever, and travel was so slow that in 1740 Metcalf, the blind road-maker, walked the 200 miles from London to Harrogate more quickly than Colonel Liddell could cover the distance in his coach with post-horses. The barbarous methods of training cavalry recruits at this period was attracting notice, as we learn from a little work on Military Equitation, by Henry Earl of Pembroke, which was published in 1761. The writer refers to the “wretched system of horsemanship at present prevailing in the army,” and refers to the common method of putting a man on a rough trotting horse, “to which he is obliged to stick with all his might of arms and legs.” Most of the officers, he says, when on horseback are a disgrace to themselves and the animals they ride; and he proceeds to urge the adoption of methods based on practical common sense.

GEORGE III. (1760-1820.)

The laws concerning horses made by the Parliaments of George III. have bearing on the subject of breeding and improvement, inasmuch as they deal with the horse as taxable property. The turf, road, and hunting history of the reign is important, the first particularly so, though the King himself took little personal interest in racing. “Give and Take” plates for horses from 12 to 15 hands were in fashion during the latter part of the last century, George II.’s Act directed against small racehorses notwithstanding. A 12-hand pony carried 5 stone, and the scale of weight for inches prescribed 14 oz. for each additional quarter of an inch; whereby 13 hands carried 7 stone, 14 hands 9 stone, 15 hands 11 stone. Hunter races were run at Ascot in 1722, and after that date the Calendar of 1762, however, is the first of the series that contains the form of “Qualification for a Hunter.”

The Royal Plates were still among the most important events of the Turf; in 1760 there were 18 of these in England and Scotland, and 6 in Ireland, 5 of the latter in Kildare. The “King’s Plate Articles,” which appear in every annual issue of the Racing Calendars for very many years, were retained in their original form. “Six-year-olds shall carry 12 stone, 14 lbs. to the stone; three heats”; but in the Calendar of 1773 a footnote occurs, “By a late order altered to one heat.” Nevertheless, very cursory inspection of the books shows that much latitude was allowed in weights, distances, and numbers of heats both before 1773 and after. In 1799 another footnote appears under the “King’s Plate Articles,” to effect that the conditions “By a late order are altered to one heat and different weights are appointed.” In spite of this order races for the plates were on occasion still run in two or three heats, apparently by permission of the Master of the Horse. We are not informed what weight the new scale required, but the pages of the Calendar show they were reduced; authoritative information on the point appears with the Articles at a later date. In 1807 the number of Royal Plates had been increased to 23 in Great Britain.

On the 4th May, 1780, the first Derby was run; the value of the stake was 50 guineas, and the race, open to three-year-old colts at 8 stone, and fillies at 7 stone 11 lbs., distance one mile, was won by Diomed. In 1801, 1803, 1807, and 1862, the weights for the Derby were altered, always increasing by a few pounds, till they reached their present level. By 1793, the Derby had grown into great popularity. The establishment of the St. Leger, in 1776, and the Oaks in 1779, are events which also aid to make King George III.’s reign memorable. Races for Arab produce occur on the Newmarket “cards” about the time our classic races were founded; sweepstakes of 100 guineas being run for in 1775, 1776, and 1777. Races for Arabs, however, have never been continued for many years in succession.

The old system of conveying mails on horseback, with its innumerable faults and drawbacks, came to an end in George III.’s time, a mail coach making its first trip in August, 1784, when the journey from Bristol to London, about 119 miles, was performed in 17 hours, or at a rate of 7 miles per hour. The era of macadamised roads, which was followed by the short “golden age” of fast coaching, can hardly be said to belong to this reign, Mr. Macadam’s system of road-making having been generally adopted only in 1819.

The founding of the Royal Veterinary College at Camden Town in 1791 was by no means the least important event of this reign; it is not too much to say that it marked an epoch in the history of the Horse; for the establishment of this institution made an end of the quackery, often exceedingly cruel, which for centuries had passed for medical treatment of animals. Until the end of the eighteenth century English veterinary practitioners had been content to follow in the footsteps of such teachers as Gervaise Markham, who was the great authority on equine diseases two hundred years before; and the principles and practice of Gervaise Markham were hardly free from the taint of witchcraft and sorcery. Some of the more drastic and obviously useless remedies had been discredited and abandoned, but at the period of which we write, English veterinarians appear to have been following their own way regardless of the more enlightened methods which were beginning to gain acceptance among the advanced practitioners of France. For to the French is due the credit of laying the first foundations on which scientific veterinary surgery was built.

The helplessness of the old school is proved by the ravages of epizootics. The loss of horses and other live stock when contagious disease gained footing was enormous, such diseases being entirely beyond the understanding of veterinarians. The last half of the eighteenth century saw the establishment of veterinary colleges in Europe. Lyons led the way in 1761; the next to be founded was that of Alfort near Paris in 1765; the next, Copenhagen, in 1773; Vienna, 1775; Berlin, 1790, and London, as already mentioned, in 1791.

Study of animal diseases was stimulated by the invasion of deadly plagues, which wrought such havoc that stock-raising in some countries threatened to disappear as an industry. Knowledge of these plagues and efficient remedies had become essential to the existence of horse and cattle breeding, and the collection of facts and correct views concerning such diseases was the greatest task of the veterinary colleges: the progress made was necessarily slow; but the foundation of veterinary surgery as a science dates from the establishment of the colleges named. For many years the new school of veterinarians were groping in the dark; but if they made no striking advance they did valuable work in collecting facts and correct views concerning animal diseases, which were of great value to a later generation.

The Royal Veterinary College was founded by a Frenchman named Charles Vial de St. Bel, or Sainbel. Sainbel was born at Lyons in 1753. His talents developed early in life, and after a brief but brilliantly successful career in France he came over to England in 1788. He published proposals for founding a Veterinary School in this country, but his suggestions were not favourably received, and he returned home. Perhaps the fact that he had married an Englishwoman during his short residence on this side of the Channel influenced Sainbel in his choice of refuge when the Revolution threatened; but however that may be, it was to London that he repaired when political unrest in Paris bade him seek a new sphere of activity.

By a stroke of good fortune Mr. Dennis O’Kelly selected the young French veterinary surgeon to dissect the carcase of the great race-horse Eclipse in February, 1789. Sainbel did the work, and wrote an “Essay on the Geometrical Proportions of Eclipse,” which attracted immediate notice and established his reputation as a veterinary anatomist.

He still cherished his scheme for founding a Veterinary School, and his abilities now being recognised, it was taken up by the Odiham Agricultural Society. In 1791 Sainbel had the satisfaction of seeing the school established, in the shape of a farriery with stabling for fifty horses. He did not live to see the success that was destined to attend his enterprise, as he died in 1793 in his fortieth year. During the two years of his work as principal, however, he had laid down the lines on which scientific veterinary practice should be conducted; in the words of his biographer, “Sainbel may justly be looked upon as the founder of scientific veterinary practice in England” (Dictionary of National Biography).

GEORGE IV. (1820-1830).

In George IV. the Turf had, perhaps, the most ardent supporter it ever boasted among our sovereigns, though the unfortunate Escape affair caused him to renounce the sport altogether for many years (1791-1810): The King was passionately fond of horses, and never wearied of trying hacks and hunters; he got together a splendid breeding stud at Hampton Court. In the last year of his reign he increased the number of Royal Plates to 43, of which 27 were run for in England, Scotland and Wales, and 16 in Ireland: he was also instrumental in bringing about vast improvements in the royal buckhounds. The legislative measures of George IV. were a bill to entirely relieve agricultural horses from taxation, the duties thereon having been reduced by George III. in the last year of his reign; and a bill to relieve horses let for travelling of the duties that had been imposed upon them by his father.

WILLIAM IV. (1830-1837).

William IV. had no great love of racing, and his personal attitude towards the sport is well reflected in his oft-quoted order to “start the whole fleet” for the Goodwood Cup of 1830. He was, however, fully alive to the national importance of racing, and did something to encourage it, presenting the Jockey Club in 1832 with one of the hoofs of Eclipse set in gold, which, with £200 given by himself, was to be run for annually by horses the property of members. “The Eclipse Foot” appears to have brought fields for only four years, and then remained an ornament of the Jockey Club rooms at Newmarket.

In the same year, 1832, a new schedule of weights was appended to the Articles for the King’s Plates; this shows that the weights to be carried varied somewhat according to the places where the races were run. No scale was prescribed for Newmarket, the conditions being left for settlement by the Jockey Club. In 1837, the last year of William’s reign, the number of Royal Plates had again increased and stood at 48, 34 in England and Scotland, 14 in Ireland.

The king continued the breeding stud at Hampton Court which his brother had bequeathed to him; if his affection for the Turf was slight, he deserves the greater credit for having maintained it.

The reign of William IV. saw the coaching age at its best, for rapid travel by road was raised to a science only a few years before its extinction by the introduction of railways. Good roads, good horses and improved coaches in combination rendered it possible to cover long distances at a uniformly high speed, from 10 to 10½ miles per hour being the rate at which the mails ran between London and Exeter, London and York, and other important centres.

HER MAJESTY QUEEN VICTORIA.
Acc. June 20, 1837.

The sale of the Hampton Court Stud is the first noteworthy event of Her Majesty’s reign. The step taken by the Queen’s advisers, with Lord Melbourne, the Prime Minister, at their head, was deeply regretted by all interested in horse breeding, as one seeming to imply that the national sport would no longer receive the patronage of the Throne. A respectful but strong memorial against the sale was presented by the Jockey Club, but without avail, and on October 25, 1837, Messrs. Tattersall disposed of the stud before a crowded audience, which included buyers from France, Germany, Russia, and other foreign countries. The catalogue included 43 brood mares, which brought 9,568 guineas; 13 colt foals, 1,471 guineas; 18 filly foals, 1,109 guineas; and 5 stallions, including The Colonel and Actæon and two imported Arabs, 3,556 guineas.

Actuated by patriotic motives and unwilling that so fine a horse should go abroad, Mr. Richard Tattersall bought The Colonel for 1,600 guineas; a price which was then considered a very large one. The total realised by sale of the stud, including a couple of geldings, was 15,692 guineas. Thirteen years later, in 1850, the clear-sightedness of H.R.H. the Prince Consort, saw that the dispersal had been a mistake, and that year saw the foundation of a new stud which flourished until 1894, when it was sent to the hammer. Regarding this second dispersal, it was urged that the stud did not pay its expenses; and although it produced The Earl, Springfield and La Flèche, good judges, including the late General Peel, were of opinion that the ground, on which for so many years Thoroughbreds had been reared, was tainted and therefore needed rest.

In 1840 the fifth Duke of Richmond brought in a bill to repeal those clauses of 13 George II. which still remained on the Statute Book limiting the value of stakes, and this measure passed into law, not without opposition (3 and 4 Vic. 5). Some interesting evidence bearing on our subject was given before the Select Committee on Gaming which was appointed in 1844. Mr. John Day gave it as his opinion that the breed of horses had much improved during the twenty to twenty-five years preceding, the improvement being apparent in riding and draught horses. Mr. Richard Tattersall shared Mr. Day’s opinion as regarded improvement, but thought fewer horses were bred. About 1836 or 1837 farmers were in such a state that they could not, or did not think it worth while to breed; by consequence the industry had fallen off and there was a scarcity. Railways, in Mr. Tattersall’s opinion, had affected the market. “The middling sort does not sell in consequence of railways; horses that used to fetch £40 now bring £17 or £18.” Riding horses sold better than the middling class, but hunters did not fetch half the price they did in former years.

The result of this investigation, as far as the horse question is concerned, was briefly summarised in the following passage of the Third Report of the Lords’ Committee. They thought it desirable that this amusement should be upheld, “because, without the stimulus which racing affords, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to maintain that purity of blood and standard of excellence which have rendered the breed of English horses superior to that of any other country in the world.”

The last statement was borne out by Mr. Tattersall’s evidence. He said that he had sent horses to every part of the world except China. America and the countries of Europe have been purchasing the best stallions and mares money could buy in England during the last hundred years and more.

In 1845 the number of Queen’s Plates stood at 51; 36 in Great Britain and 15 in Ireland. In 1861 the scale of weights was remodelled and made applicable to all the Plates wherever run; and in the same year it was enacted that “none of Her Majesty’s Plates shall be run in heats.”

Some few abortive attempts to control racing by law have been made since Her Majesty’s accession. In 1860 Lord Redesdale introduced into the House of Lords a bill to stop light-weight racing by fixing the minimum weight at 7 stone. This measure was withdrawn, Lord Derby and Lord Granville, also a member of the Jockey Club and leader of the Liberal Party in the House of Lords, promising on behalf of the Jockey Club that that body was prepared to deal with the matter; but nothing was done in the direction indicated.

In May, 1870, Mr. Thomas Hughes, the member for Frome, brought in a bill to amend the laws relating to racing. This bill proposed to make it unlawful to race any horse or mare under three years old, and to make the Queen’s Plates open only to horses four years old and upwards. Mr. Hughes, in introducing his measure, said that between 1843 and 1868 the number of two-year-olds running had increased fourfold, while the number of races of a mile and upwards had decreased, and urged that the system which had grown up tended to cause deterioration in the breed of horses. As was well known at the time, Mr. Hughes was indebted for his facts and figures to Sir Joseph Hawley. This bill was read a first time by 132 votes to 44, but was withdrawn in the following July.

Great and radical changes had come over the Turf during the twenty-five years mentioned by Mr. Hughes, but they were only incidental to the general process of Turf development which has been going on since the advent of the railway.

In 1836 the travelling van was first used for conveying a horse from training quarters to the race course. Lord George Bentinck, who managed Lord Lichfield’s racing stable, resolved at the last moment to run Elis in the St. Leger, and astonished the betting fraternity by producing him at Doncaster in time for the race; to do this he had borrowed a van which had been constructed to carry fat cattle to Smithfield Show. The fact that Elis won the St. Leger to which he had been brought in this, then novel, fashion no doubt did something to stimulate the practice of transporting race horses thus; but the van was gradually superseded by the horse-box, which was first employed for the purpose about 1840.

Railways, as they spread over the country, did much to increase the number of meetings held and to increase the numbers of entries. We find that in the period between 1827 and 1837 the number of horses running increased from 1,166 in the former year to 1,213 in the latter; while during the period between 1860, when railroads had become numerous, and 1870, the number of horses running rose from 1,717 in the former year to 2,569 in the latter.

The development of the daily sporting press and the spread of the telegraph system have also contributed to the changes on the Turf. By quickening the interest of the people in racing, these factors have helped to increase the attendance on race courses, and at “gate money meetings,” to enhance the funds at the disposal of promoters, whereby the latter are able to offer in prize money sums beyond the conception of our grandfathers in the early years of the century.

With the increase in the number of meetings, of horses running and the value of prizes, other changes have gradually crept in. The Challenge Whip remains the solitary survival of the old four-mile races. The Whip, it may be well to remind the reader, was originally the property of Thomas Lennard, Lord Dacre, whose arms are engraved upon it. Lord Dacre was created Earl of Sussex in 1674 by Charles II.: he was devoted to the Turf, and it is believed that he left his Whip (a short, heavy, old-fashioned jockey-whip with hair from the tail of Eclipse interwoven into the ring on the handle) as a trophy to be run for at Newmarket. He died in 1715, but the first race for the Whip does not appear to have been run till 1756, when Mr. Fenwick’s Match’em won from Mr. Bowles’ Trajan. Gimcrack, Mambrino, Shark, Pot-8-os, Dungannon, Thormanby, and many other famous horses have run for the Whip. The course is the Beacon, 4 miles 1 furlong 177 yards, and the weight to be carried is 10 stone.

The tendency for years has been in favour of short races at the expense of long distance events. At the Newmarket Craven meeting of 1820 there was one race of about three miles, five races of two miles or over, twenty of about one mile and two of under one mile. At the Newmarket Craven meeting of 1900 there were three races of about one mile and a half, six of about one mile, and eleven of five or six furlongs. The necessity for breeding race horses that could carry from ten to twelve stone twice or thrice in an afternoon over a four-mile course has disappeared altogether. In his place we have the animal which can carry seven stone over six or seven furlongs at a pace that would probably have left Eclipse hopelessly behind, but which is useless for any purpose off the race-course.

The highly artificial existence to which our race horses are now subjected, jealously protected from change of temperature, and “forced” in preparation to take part in two-year-old races, has done much to impair fitness to beget horses that will stand work in the hunting field or on the road. This is a result of the changes which have come over the English Turf during the century. We must, however, retrace our steps and glance at the endeavours to improve our horses which have been made within the last thirty years.