Sporting Review AND LICENSED VICTUALLERS' GAZETTE. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Thursday, November 26, 1896. AUSTRALIAN HORSES.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume VII, Issue 331, 26 November 1896, Page 6

Sporting Review AND LICENSED VICTUALLERS' GAZETTE. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Thursday, November 26, 1896. AUSTRALIAN HORSES.

The news that Merman has been sold byMr W. B. Wilson to go to England is another satisfactory evidence that the English market is open to the breeders of good stock bred m Australasia, and the fact should be particularly encouraging to New Zealand breeders, because it has been established that here we have obtained a pronounced lead in the production of the best animals that have graced the turf of Australia. In support of that contention we have only to mention the names of Carbine, Trenton, Nordenfeldt. Maxim, St. Leger, Nelson, and Lochiel, together with such mares as Hilda, Lady Zetland, Merganser, and a host of others. Of course these thoroughbreds owe their origin to the best blood of England, but it seems that that blood improves by its introduction to the climate and country of New Zealand. Musket was a good horse in England, but it remained with New Zealand to make his fame, and this, coupled with other evidences of the improvement of imported stock, incline to suggest the thought that the Land of the Moa is the paradise of the thoroughbred, and with such animals as we have at Wellington Park, Sylvia Park, and, indeed, all over New Zealand, it will be surprising if we do not continue to contribute ornaments of the turf quite as good as those we have bred in the past. The price paid for the Australian-bred Merman (1,500 guineas) is a good one, considering his performances, and probably his value has been enhanced by the renown of the New Zealanders, Carbine and Trenton, coupled with the recent brilliance of Newhaven. Merman is by the unbeaten New South Wales champion, Grand Flaneur (sire of Hopscotch) out of Seaweed. He has the reputation of being a good horse, but has done nothing particularly good in public, possibly because he has shown the uneven temper exhibited by many of the Grand Flaneur stock In the late Caulfield Cup he played up at the post and was badly left, but the fact that he ran fourth indicates that he would probably have won had he taken kindly to his work. Since then he beat a splendid field in the Williamstown Cup, and if in England he will only gallop when wanted he should improve the reputation of the Australians.