Narellan

Otago Witness, Issue 1892, 15 May 1890, Page 27

Narellan

occupies No. 3, between Plutarch on his left and Kirkham on hia right, and has in every respect similar quarters — clean, well kept, and as comfortable as a room in a swell hotel. As soon as the rugs are thrown off him, my friend and I involuntarily cry " How wonderfully like Abercorn ! " " Isn't he, sir," says Boase, who is present. " Did you ever see two horses more alike ? " And indeed we say that barring the colour we never dia. He is a much darker chestnut than either Abercorn or Kirkham, but the form of the great son of Chester and Cinnamon is there in nearly every detail. There is no mistake about the quality this Derby candidate shows — beautiful rein, high in the shoulder, deep and powerful in the chest, a clean barrel, sloping rump, a set of legs that no amount of work would apparently break down, and withal a spirit and energy about him which brings him into strange contrast with his indolent colleague. And y,et a horse could not be more contented or docile. Somehow Boase believes in Eirkham, but the average observer would not hesitate to plump for Narellan. It is quite certain where Mr Dawson pins his faith, but of that anon. We learn from Mr Briggs that Narellan is " a perfect whale for work," and never seems to know when he has had enough. They will take him out and canter him a couple of times, and then rattle him along for a mile and a-half or two miles, and he'll pull up as fresh as paint, and all the way home anxious to get away and have some more. An English sporting writer said the other day there was no mistake about the capacity for work possessed by the Australians, as they were apparently doing double as much as any other Derby candidate, and thriving on it ; and he added, quite truly, they had " not been sick or borry a single day since they landed," which was a proof of the soundness of their constitutions.