ROYAL PICTURE

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 28, 3 February 1938, Page 13

ROYAL PICTURE

SIRE OF CAY ARTIST

Though he has been at the stud for ten years, the grey horse Royal Picture had only his second winning representative in the grey mare Gay Artist last week. Gay Artist did the job right, however, by taking no less than three events on the Pahiatua card. Royal Picture was imported by Mr. J. A. Taylor in 1925. As a juvenile he had run into the money in .England, but when raced here he was more or less a lailure, his only win being in a novice event at Woodville. Mr. .G. Booth used him for several seasons at the stud in the Wairarapa, but he was not very widely patronised by owner* of thoroughbred mares, and a couple of years ago he was bought by Mrs. E. Gordon, of Waimate, where he is now standing. His only previous winner was the grey mare Heliotype, who won the Hawke's Bay Steeplechase and other cross-country events four years ago. • This grey stallion, who is now fifteen years old, is a son of the Polymelus horse Folyghotus, a' good winner in England. He obtains his colour from his dam, King's Picture, who was, by the grey Roi Herode.. King's Picture is closely related to the- One Thousand Guineas winner.Canyon, the dam of' the Two Thousand Guineas winner Colorado, sire of Ringmaster and of Melfort, whose first yearlings had brought such good prices at recent sales in the Dominion and ■ Sydney respectively. The grey. colour in thoroughbreds is always handed on from one parent to the offspring,'-and never skips a generation. Royal Picture has been leaving; a good proportion of greys, and Gay Artist, last week's treble winner, is one of .them... This .mare, is what s known as an "iron" grey, a colour -tSat' in; the'foal- stage'is-,often 'mistaken for black, and there was a doubt for some time about what her dolour was going to turn out. "Even now- the grey is very dark, .but it is sufficiently obvious to make., her already very popular .with the -= rank and file \ of racegoers. ;„■ , ■:■ -■ ■■;.: -' Gay Artist won all her three races well last week with strong runs over the''final two furlongs, but she was probably lucky on the first day: to beat another Royal Picture : horse, Royal Portrait,, who broke down a furlong from home and then was ousted only by a head. In-each, race the grey improved. 'She was assisted'to her treble by the. conditons of the programme excluding the winner of the. Trial"Plate on the second day 'from the penalty clause^ attaching to previous winners duringthe.dayv Messrs. G. A. Vincent and W;' D. Moroney, who are racing the' mare; hold her on;lease for two years from ;Mrs. J.Brydon, of Carterton. •'..■■-. - *...'*. r ' . .