HORSELESS ENGLAND.

Timaru Herald, Volume XIIC, Issue 13974, 7 August 1909, Page 3

HORSELESS ENGLAND.

J ••• twr_i - A FORECAST. lir five years' time from now there will ..scarcely.'be a single horse leit m England except the-lew animals which are kept; ior pleasure and tlie. -sipull tradesiiien's liov-se. : The bus and. the. ■cab./horse are growing scarcer,, not every, year, but every, month and every - week, and' in a very Miort time tliey will bf ■practically extinct; The: extinction of the horse' is duo to the general /'adoption of- the -motor L both tor business and pleasure;.- Siijpe the. introduction of/the, motors' bus and the electric tram ' the big omnibus icompanies ha ve •> taken thousands of horses. off the road,:;and they are ; .-gettiug rid of othei-s- in large quantities' almost every day. ' All. the provincial horse-'bus companies are : doing the.: same,, and since . the introduction ol taxi-cubs the proprietors of hansoms and four wheelers are -following suit. It is..- quite useless for horse-'buses to /attempt to continue on the road' except on -a. few cross routes which -areunfitted for .motor traffic./ -On the, L.C.O.'s ele.ctric trams 1 a. passenger by a workman's .car can travel'fronv Gatford to a distance of sixteen miles, for a fare of twopence! r J ne extinction of the horse is a .very serious probleili from the .military point ot ; ylew, and •> what we should do ■ .in the event ol another >big war it is impossible to .say. • In the South. Airicau ••'iW-tir we. hud the horserinarkets .pt the world to draw upon, but experts declare that ,we should never be abie to do so m a Ing war again. A War Uilice statement reveals tlie fact that in the first year ot a big war 110 iewer than 832,0u0 horses/ would, be ...required, of which 180,000 would be riding horses.. But at tlie present £ime there arc only about IoOjOOO horses in the country suitable for cavalry purposes, and the birth-rate is-declining in an alarming manner. .. . - ~ ■ , 'J f War were declared at the present time we could not attempt - .to mobilise, the Regulars and the Territorials, because we ha ve not. the. horses, to mount tlie men and convoy the triiiisjwrt.... At. the present tune many oi'- our Army horses are being, used three times over. ■That is to say, ,that: horses belonging, to 'bus companies and job-masters which are now registered, by the wai Othce to be calleU up tor service with the Regulars on' mobahsation being used by the .Yeomanry ior their I riding schools and their equips, ;> na to a considerable extent by . the infantry Territorials as well.. ) Ihe samehorse. will.often attend camp with thiee different regiments in one. year ! Evorv day suitable horses grow more impossible to obtain.' As the demand for -thsni for business and pleasure declines, so farmers cease to breed them, and in addition all the best' mares in the countrv of a suitable type, were sent out to the war in feoiitli Africa, few of them returning,, and. •we are ■therefore breeding from inferior stock. There is c.hly one. ..small gleam of satisfaction to 'the 'hor.xev" man in the; univev-al adoption of motor traction, and ..that is, strange to say, that it. lirs t/lvn a tremendous lilin to horse ridi!-"' v pleasure. Po.snhly- this may lie nr>rtly accounto.-l for by the fact that number!; of men who had nerc'.' -■>rr'.-i"nsly br-rn astride a horse learn'- J -" ■'ide dtiriiv the wn>\ but it also I—vr 1 ;- due to t';e i'-ict that, with the .id'i"tion of the nirtor, people of menr l, "--'t far 1o«r exercise. in other wars 1 ;i" n thev did formerly. The consemvn- - J* that them hnn been a big " born-" " in-horse riding for pleasure, nnt who onrt nffnro ■to'keep ■' horse of their own. butamnnc others who rn onlv afford to hire a mount for a. Saturday or Sunday afternoon's ride.