ENGLISH v. COLONIAL HORSES.

Otago Witness, Issue 2356, 20 April 1899, Page 36

ENGLISH v. COLONIAL HORSES.

There is a great deal of difference of "opinion in this country, writes the Leader's English correspondent, about the wisdom of going to Australia for fresh blood, and there '•re many persons who ' argue that the importation of Carbine and Trenton was a grave mistake. The next year or. two will tell !the tale, and the world will know who is right and who is wrong. But when it is 'considered that the English thoroughbreds «re becoming more delicate and less enduring every generation, and that they are especially weak in their legs and feet, it appears tolerably certain that the importation of the sound, large boned, hardy animals which have come from Australia must be beneficial to the British blood. Australian horses have bigger bone, better legs and feet, are better (weight carriers, and are certainly hardier and Bounder tban*fcne majority of horses bred in 1 Ihis country. Even if the offspring of Trenton, Carbine, and the others are not great ■ successes on the flat, there can be no doubt fchart they would make admirable steeplefchaeerS and -hunters. It is said by the opponents of the Australian sires that few , torses from the Antipodes have done " much in 'the way of steeplechasing in this fcountry. The answer to this is very simple. iHorses » which have been accustomed to feteeplcchasing in Australia, and especially in .Victoria, find that the conditions in this fcountry are entirely different. With you £he obstacles are post and rail fences and fcod walls, which cannot be touched with impunity, and the cleverest horse finds it imposeible.to take them in his stride. Here, on the other hand, the so-called fences are of eloping birchwood,, which can be rushed through without any danger of a fall. An 'Australian horse when he comes to England jumps far too high, and, to use the phrase of ' a jockey to me, " wastes too much time in fche air." If any Australian owner were, to bring home some likely 1 young horses, and fechool them in this country, they would have a far better chance than if they had been iridden. ojjer the* sticks at Flemington and Caulfield, - and had everything to unlearn when they made their appearance on an English steeplechase course under the National Hunt rules. What is called a steeplechase in this country would in Australia be termed • very easy hurdle race.