SOME BOOKS ABOUT HORSES.*
THE fourth volume of Mr. Taunton's Portraits of Celebrated Racehorses brings to an end the work, which, as the author tells us in his preface, has taken him nearly twenty years to compile. The period over which the collection extends may be said to include the whole history of the Turf, commencing as it does with portraits and notices of the famous Arabian stallions whose importation in the beginning of the last century had such an effect in raising the class of English horses ; for even those who depreciate Arabian horses as com- pared with English in the present day, must admit that the produce of the Darley and Godolphin Arabians, and others of their kind, proved vastly superior to anything in the way of English-bred horses that could be found in their time. That, of course, is not necessarily an argument for preferring Arabian horses in our own day; but it should be remembered that there are few, if any, of our best racehorses that cannot be traced back to one or other of those celebrated barbs.
The limit reached by Mr. Taunton is less than twenty years ago, so that the work has been carried on well into our own time. Still, history becomes ancient so quickly in these days, and the prominent figures on the Turf are so much altered since that time, that one has a feeling that the book should not finally end here. We can hardly expect Mr. Taunton to set to work again at once on a work that seems to take him, on an average, five years a volume ; but we may express a hope that it may be continued some day. There is not the same need for such a book in these days, when portraits of distinguished horses are growing as cheap and common as if they were only politicians or actors, but we still think that a continuation which would deal with such champions of later days as Isonomy," Peter," Robert the Devil,' Ben- digo,' &c., would be generally well received. The volume now before us contains many of the most famous names of turf history, all the winners of the Derby and Oaks, and (with a few exceptions) of the St. Leger, between 1846 and 1870, being in- cluded in the list. Voltigeur," Stockwell," West Australian,' Wild Dayrell,' Blink Bonny' (the famous mare who achieved the extraordinary feat of winning both the Derby
• (1) Portraits of Celebrated Racehorses of the Past and Present Centuries. By Thomas Henry Taunton, M.S. Vol. IV. London: Sampson Low, Marston, Searle, and Itivington. 1988.-12) The Horse and his Rider an Anecdotic Medley By "Thormanby." London: Chatto and Winans. 1888.—(3.) High. -ways and Horses. By Athol Maudslay. London : Chapman and Hall. 1888.
and the Oaks), and her equally celebrated son Blair Athol,' Beadsman," Thormanby," Macaroni," Gladiateur," Lord
Lyon,' Hermit,' are only a few names taken at random from the number. The portraits themselves are very unequal. The previous volumes have contained few better plates than that of
Vauban,' and few worse than that representing Diophantus.' Considerable praise is due to the portrait of Stockwell,' which gives a good representation of the great size and extra- ordinarily strong build of that famous sire. On the other band, we should never have imagined, judging only from the portrait given by Mr. Taunton, that Hobbie-Noble ' " was, in all his points, so extremely handsome, and to the eye so very beau- tiful, that her Majesty sent for him a second time to the front of the Royal stand at Ascot." Among other good plates are those of Flying Dutchman,' lifounseer," West Australian,' Knight of St. George," Regalia," Lord Lyon," Achievement,' and Pero Gomez.' An interesting description is given of the famous struggle between the last-named horse and 'Pretender' for the Derby, which the rider of Pero' always believed him- self to have won, though the judge was of a different opinion.
Another exciting contest for a stake of less importance which is narrated at length, is that between the Earl' and Blue Gown' for the Biennial at Newmarket,—though we are glad to see that Mr. Taunton passes over the dismal and disreputable incidents which marked the history of the Turf in 1868, with the slightest reference possible. The historical records of this volume are always full ; indeed, the race for the Doncaster Cup between Flying Dutchman' and Voltigeur ' in 1850 is not only fully described in prose, but is also the subject of a poem, which Mr. Taunton might just as well have left out. The portraits of several famous jockeys are added to those of their more celebrated mounts, and the frontispiece per- petuates the memory of that respected potentate, " Judge " Clark. Another interesting feature is an account of one of the wild Lord March's fantastic wagers—the chaise-match run at Newmarket in 1750—which might have been more suitably placed in one of the earlier volumes.
The Horse and his Rider may be described as a work of great erudition. The amount of more or less extinct re- positories of sporting anecdote which must have been searched to supply its pages might have deterred a less energetic collector ; but " Thormanby " has perhaps been comforted by the feeling that his labours ended with the task of selection for the original portion of the work appears to be contained in the tags that join the stories together. It would be un- generous to say that we have heard some of these stories before, because they do not pretend to be new. The readers of " Nimrod " or the " Old Shekarry " will be familiar with a number of the anecdotes ; but, after all, there are a great many of us who are not acquainted with these writers, and we should be grateful to " Thormanby " for picking out the plums for us from the various puddings which he has examined. Some of the anecdotes are good, others —to quote a French writer whose experiences of hunting in England are given in the volume before us—are of that kind " which only make the English laugh," while some may perhaps even fail to attain this simple end. Among the best we would mention " Old Calabar's " amusing account of a race-meeting at St. Malo in days when the sport was not so generally accepted and understood in France as it is now ; while to those who prefer stories of adventure, we can recommend the exciting narrative of the chase of a wild stallion in Australia, the authority for which is unfortunately not given.
A considerable portion of the book is devoted to ingenious tricks and dodges in which horses have been used by the in- ferior animal, man, for the purpose of overreaching his neighbour, both in horse-dealing and racing. In the latter class, an anecdote is given of a match arranged in the days of George I., " between the notorious Tregonwell Frampton and Sir W. Strickland, to run two horses over Newmarket for a considerable sum of money," in which the more dishonest party proved the losers :—
" After Sir W. Strickland's horse had been a short time at Newmarket, Frampton's groom, with the knowledge of his master, endeavoured to induce the baronet's groom to have a private trial at the weights and distance of the match, and thus to make the race safe. Sir William's man had the honesty to inform his master of the proposal, when he ordered him to accept it, but to be sure to deceive the other by putting seven pounds more weight in the stuffing of his own saddle. Frampton's groom had already done the same thing ; and in the trial, ` Merlin,' Sir William's horse, beat his opponent about a length. Now,' said Frampton to his satellite, my fortune is made, and so is yours ; if our horse can run so near Merlin' with seven pounds extra, what will he do in the race?' The betting was immense. The south-country turfites, who had been let into the secret by Frampton, told those from the north that they would bet them gold against 'Merlin ' while gold they had, and then they might sell their land.' Both hoises came well to the post, and of course the race came off like the trial."
This happened in a civilised country ; but we have other anecdotes to show that the demoralising influences of educa- tion are not requisite for the production of the most finished
swindlers,—witness the story of the three matches in which the American officers of a fort in Texas were completely over- reached by a band of Comanches. " Thormanby " also gives some curious instances of the natural intelligence of horses,— or their instinct, if we are to use the very clearly understood term applied by scientific ignorance in all such cases. Among the most amusing of these, is an anecdote of an unfortunate charger whose duty it was to carry an extremely fat and heavy Indian General. Feeling that this task was more than could be reasonably required of him, the intelligent animal invariably lay down and refused to get up whenever the General tried to mount him, and so far gained his object that his owner sold him to a young officer who was going to a distant station up- country. Two years afterwards, the General went to inspect some frontier cantonments, and as he travelled to his destina- tion in a palanquin, was obliged to borrow a charger for the purpose of the inspection. There was some difficulty in finding one up to his weight :—
"At length an officer resigned to him a powerful horse for the occasion, which was brought out, duly caparisoned, in front of the line. The General came forth from his tent, and proceeded to mount; but the instant the horse saw him advance, he flung himself flat upon the sand, and neither blows nor entreaties could induce him to rise. It was the General's old charger, who from the moment of quitting his service had never once practised the artifice until this second meeting. The General, who was an ex- ceedingly good-humoured man, joined heartily in the universal shout that ran through the whole line on witnessing this ludicrous affair."
Mr. Maudslay's ponderous volume on Highways and Horses displays erudition of a different kind. In this case, the records of coaching history have been ransacked to supply what in- formation of public interest there may be on the subject. The result, as disseminated through some hundreds of pages, does not appear to be very large. If it is desirable that we should have an exhaustive history of coaches and hackney-carriages, this work should be of some value, as it is evidently the result of considerable study. We cannot say that it is particularly entertaining ; but then, few histories are,
unless they indulge in legends, or, at least, are seasoned with good, healthy prejudice. There is, however, considerable interest in the account of Bianconi and the cars he started in Ireland, and the chapters on coachbuilding and harness con- tain plenty of sound, practical information. Like most writers of this kind, Mr. Maudslay is at his best when he sticks closest to his subject ; when he diverges into general topics, there is an immediate change for the worse. There is, for instance, one chapter of comparisons between the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, roaming wildly over all kinds of subjects, from highwaymen to abolitionists, which a judicious editor would certainly have expunged, thereby making the book the richer by the loss of sixty entirely superfluous pages. The illustrations are excellent throughout.
Previous page
