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Star (Christchurch), Issue 5454, 4 January 1896, Page 4

Australasian SwftiMiNG Championships. — Mr W. J. Stratton and Mr Alfred Harrison, captain of the Ashburton Club, left by the Waihora last evening for Sydney. A number of swimmers met at the station to wish them success. Agricultural depression has been -greatly in evidence of late yeare in West End stables. Twenty years ago about a score of noblemen and gentlemen kept studs of from twenty to thirty horses for London tise in the season. The studs would comprise, say, two four-ih-hand teams, a couple or more of carriage-horse pairs, three or four single-horse turnouts, for buggy, dog* cart, or cabriolet, and some half-dozen-more or less — park hacks and polo ponies for family use. Such were the good days of old, before rents had to be reduced by one-half, and unlet farms hung heavily on the hands of the descendants of the Conqueror and the Ftestnfrraeis. At the present iriAmoTit thfcro is jn'cbr bly noi/.-i gentleman's stable west of Charing Cross containing more than, ten or a dozen horses, the property ofcjpflftiadisiijjal oim««< . ~