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RACING GOSSIP There is evidently sharp need of a press censor so far as casual comment on racing is concerned Here is one bright idea ideaIf If EO per cent of the money now given to twoyearold events were hung up for three yearolds it would certainly result in groat benefit to the turf as owners of overgrown and backward twoyearolds would then have more inducement to wait on them a nd give them a chance to mature and get strength strengthAs As a matter of fact to the American public twoyearold racing is most fascinating By the American records it is most consistent On the common sense plane of the survival of the fit ¬ test for the good of the future it is most busi ¬ nesslike Of course such rot has English origin Most of the recent lessons given out for Ameri ¬ can owners have such foundation In the face of the natural law of vigor applied to generation the Chicago Horseman still dabbling in racing printed this some time ago agoLeamington Leamington got his best horses when quite advanced Leamington got Parole at 18 Oh tipa at 10 Harold at 22 Sensation at 23 Iro quois and Spinaway at 24 Onondaga at 25 Bonnie Scotland did not succeed at all until late in life as he got Bramble at 21 Luke Blackburn at 21 and George Kinuey at 25 Eolus got Mo rello at 21 Norfolk got El Bio Key at 26 Lex ¬ ington got Duke of Magenta at 24 In England Hampton got Ladas at 18 Hermit got Friars Balsam at 19 Solon got Barcaldine at 18 18The The argument against this roll is the super ¬ iority of the dams clr sen by the wisdom of RVflnt and experience American and English turf annals shine with the luster of the young sire Why not Youth is vitality Let old times men and horses rest Theyve had their r wn glory and their own days They need the rest natural to the veteran The present is best and the average of today as much better than tiiat of yesterday as the percentage of tomor ¬ row will bo better than that of now This is as natural as the law of gravitation What a tired feeling comes over one after reading the stuff which this and that fathead writes about old timers and what they didnt do The parade of nonperformance in fight ¬ ing racing and business lines is mere slop and oiobbr What is done seems far better than what can be done and isut Today is as much better than yesterday as yesterday was ahead of the day before If not a general committee with power to round up and mix poison and Luinanity should be appointed it sickens a modern man with an eye of action in his head to read about Mile Demosthenes Virgil Julius Caesar Boecius Eclipse John Law Maud S and other creatures of the past 6andow Gladstone Tennyson Grant Mansfield li nry of Navarre Morgan and Alix in order outclass their ancient antagonists If they didnt life has been a long bluff and there isnt anything in human ingenuity To go the sharp Tjcsfc of illustration modern judgment considers tli fit Corbett could have licked Tom Sayers with one hand Navarre was equal to a two lengths in hand defeat of Eclipse that Gladstone or the silver tongued Castelar could have smothered Demosthenes Sandow make a sucker of Milo ant withstanding that ox punch and meal of his and Pierrepoint Morgan put rings around Law had the desperation of 1896 gone to the angle of South Sea Bubble speculation The performing figures of 1500 were dubbed as heroes for the action that causes the suicides and crim ¬ inal trials of 1897 The pasts all right as a book of experience Fiut it will not do in other lines Grant could never have found time to watch the ramifica tions of a spider Bruce did and the spiders gyrations changed Scottish history Its 100 to Ic too that there isnt any bridge that any Captain of the Gate or Ramnian proud with a side partner could keep against a modern army A stick of dynamite would put the dauntless three out of the business in ten sec ¬ onds Neither could the brave days of old uncover a dyspeptic stomach put it on a plat ¬ ter wash it out put it back again and apply it to its owners appetite appetiteFor For experience purposes the days that are no more are all right They are rather indecent slightly savage and not any too correct But theres instruction in their chronicles and they had sharp figures which helped the march of progress on the road of time But I will not stand the slop and slobber of fatheadism which declares that the item of 1800 was better than or as good as the same item of 1897 Its libel ¬ lous and the man or woman who offers it for digestion should be restrained
