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The great test of merit in a steeplechase horse is success in the Grand National, which is always run at Liverpool during the first week of the flat-racing season. The course is 4 m., and includes thirty jumps, the fences being for the most part larger than are found elsewhere. The

average time occupied is well under ten minutes. The stake has varied in value since the race was originated in 1839; it now amounts to close on £2500. Only a very small percentage of steeplechase horses possess the speed and staying power to give them a chance in this race, and the number of entries year by year falls considerably short of a hundred, the prospects of many of these usually appearing hopeless to all but unduly sanguine owners. The average number of starters during the period 1860–1901 was rather over twenty. As many as thirty-two competed in 1909, when the French-bred Latteur III. won; in 1883, when Zoedone, ridden by her owner, Count Kinsky, was successful, only ten went to the post. Mishaps are almost invariably numerous; in most years about one-third complete the course. So severe is the task that for a long time many good judges of steeplechasing believed that no horse with more than 12 stone on his back could possibly win. In 1893, however, Cloister won in a canter by forty lengths carrying 12 st. 7 ℔, and with the same weight Manifesto also won in 1899. The race which most nearly approaches the Grand National in importance is the Lancashire Handicap Steeplechase, run at Manchester over 3 m. early in April. The stake is worth about £1750. An interesting steeplechase called the Grand Sefton takes place at Liverpool about the middle of November; the distance is 3 m. During the winter, and extending into the spring, steeplechasing and hurdle racing are carried on at Sandown, Kempton, Gatwick, Lingfield, Newbury and Hurst Park; at Ludlow, Newmarket, Aldershot, Birmingham, Manchester, Windsor and other places. A race called the National Hunt Steeplechase, under the immediate patronage of the National Hunt Committee, is run annually over a 4-mile course, the stake being £1000. Managers of various courses bid for the privilege of having the race on their ground, and it is therefore found in different localities. A condition is that no horse who has ever won a race can compete; and, as few owners are willing to keep their animals with a view to success in this event, the field consists either of unknown horses or of those that have been beaten.

Racing in Australia has its headquarters at Sydney, under the government of the Australian Jockey Club, the principal course being at Ranwick; and at Melbourne, where the Victoria Jockey Club is supreme, the principal course being at Flemington. In New Zealand sport is carried on under the authority of delegates from the chief racing clubs, who meet in conference. There is a Sydney Derby and a Victoria Derby, and a notable event at Flemington is the Champion Race, weight-for-age, for three-year-olds and upwards, which usually attracts the best horses in training, as the fee at which a sire stands depends in a great measure on his success in this contest. This race is over a distance of 3 m., and to ensure a good pace there is a regulation that the time in which it is run must not exceed 5 minutes 40 seconds, though the stewards have power to extend this in case the ground should be made exceptionally heavy by rainy weather. The Melbourne Cup is regarded as one of the most important races in the state. This is a handicap, and in comparison with English races may perhaps be ranked with the Cesarewitch. The birth of horses dates from the 1st of August, which corresponds as nearly as possible to the 1st of February in England, so that the Australian horses are practically seven months younger than the English—a matter of some importance in the case of those sent to run in England. There are few races which close long before the date of decision, and practically all the good animals run in handicaps. The five- and six-furlong races for other than two-year-olds, so common in Great Britain, are extremely rare; and it is asserted by colonial sportsmen that their horses stay better than those bred in England, a circumstance which is largely attributed to the fact that mares and foals have much more liberty and exercise than is the case in the mother country.

Horse-racing was indulged in to a limited extent in Maryland and Virginia as early as the middle of the 17th century, particularly in the latter colony. Most of the inhabitants of both were either from the British Isles or were descended from parents who had immigrated from them, and they inherited a taste for the sport. The animals used for this purpose, however, were not highly prized at the time, and the pedigree of not even one of them has been preserved. A horse called Bully Rock by the Darley Arabian out of a mare by the Byerly Turk, granddam by the Lister Turk, great-granddam a royal mare, foaled 1718, is the first recorded importation of a thoroughbred horse into America. He was imported into Virginia in 1730. In 1723 the duke of Bolton bred a mare named Bonny Lass by his celebrated horse Bay Bolton out of a daughter of the Darley Arabian. She became celebrated in England as a brood mare, and was the first thoroughbred mare, according to the records, that was carried to America. This is supposed to have been in or after 1740, as the Stud-Book shows she produced in England after 1739 a filly by Lord Lonsdale’s Arabian, and subsequently became familiar to the public as the granddam of Zamora. The importations increased very rapidly from this period, and many valuable shipments were made before the war which resulted in a separation of the colonies from the mother country. This acquisition of thoroughbred stock increased the number and value of racing prizes, and extended the area of operations into the Carolinas in the South, and New Jersey and New York in the North. The first race run in South Carolina was in February 1734 for £20. It took place over “the Green,” on Charleston Neck. This shows that the earlier races in America were actually on the turf, as they have always been in England. The next year a Jockey Club was organized at Charleston (1735), and a course was prepared, such as those which came later into general use throughout the states, the turf being removed and the ground made as level as possible.

After 1776, when the United States declared their independence of Great Britain, the importation of thoroughbred horses from England became quite common, and selections were made from the best stocks in the United Kingdom. This continued and even increased as the country became developed, down to 1840. The following Derby winners were among those carried into the states: Diomed, who won the first Derby in 1780; Saltram, winner in 1783; John Bull, winner in 1792; Spread Eagle, winner in 1795; Sir Harry, winner in 1798; Archduke, winner in 1799; and Priam, who won in 1830. The most important and valuable importations, however, proved to be Jolly Roger, Fearnought, Medley, Traveller, Diomed, Glencoe, Leviathan, Tranby, Lexington, Margrave, Yorkshire Buzzard, Albion and Leamington. The best results were obtained from Diomed and Glencoe. Diomed sired one horse, Sir Archy, who founded a family to which nearly all the blood horses of America trace back. He was foaled in 1805, in Virginia, and became celebrated as a sire. The superiority of his progeny was so generally conceded that they were greatly sought after. From this period, too, the number and value of races increased; still they were comparatively few in number, and could not compare in value with those of Great Britain. Up to 1860 the value of racing prizes was quite inadequate to develop large breeding establishments,