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HILDRETH HORSES READY TO TRAIN, Every Member of Americas Leading Stable Benefited in Appearance by a Winters Rest. New York, March 22. Fitz Herbert is the show horse of S. C. Ilildrelhs barn at Sheepshead Bay. Eleven hundred pounds is considerable weight for a horse that one keeps within five or six weeks of a race, but the Ilildreth star weighs all of it. Nor is it likely that he will lose much tlesh In the course of the coming summer. .Mr. lllldreths horses have a way of keeping their tlesh under the hardest campaigning and going into winter quarters looking better than they did iu the spring. Fitz Herberts neck is a bit bigger than it was and he seeins to be tilling out all over, hut it would be- improper perhaps to say that he is Improved in appearance over last year. Ho was about as line a piece of korse-llesh as a man would wish to see last year. Fitz Herbert will be campaigned in a manner befitting tho greatest horse of his age It will not take a great deal of work to get the big brown racer ready. Mr. Ilildreth put the measuring standard to Fitz Herbert and King James recently and found that the horses are about of equal height a shade under sixteen hands one inch. This will surprise many close observers because on the track King James does not appear to have the height of the son of Ethclbert and Morganatic. The reason or this optical illusion Is that King James is a larger barreled horse than close coupled Fitz Herbert and he does not readily show his height. There probably is not twenty pounds difference in weight between the two horses. After King James victory over Hilarious in the Brighton Mile at Yonkers last summer It looked as though he was all in. He was so lame that Mr. Ilildreth himself was apprehensive. The Plaudit horse wrenched one of his - legs so severely when his foot turned on a boulder-shaped stone that it looked as though he had surely bowed a tendon. But as he had done many a time before King James has come back. If Mr. Ilildreth does not miss his guess the lop-eared horse is as good as ever. Fitz Herbert and King James, with the promising young three-year-olds, Novelty and Zeus, are the brag quartet of the strongest stable of racers on the American turf. Handsomer three-year-olds than the sons or Kingston and Adam are not to be found anywhere. Novelty has not yet attained the ideal height of sixteen hands and it is possible that he never will. He is a short-legged horse with a great body, splendid oblique shoulders, strong quarters and admirably matched- legs The standard shows .him to: be just .15.:! and -he shades a lot of ground. Noveltyls still the tractable, willing colt he was last year, and his owner has not the smallest fear tliat ho will riot go as far next season as any "three-year-old. Zeus is a colt of the Adam type running high at the withers: -There is much about him to like, although he does not just now stand a favorable comparison with Novelty, but Mr. Ilildreth has an idea that he will Improve under training. August Be-lmonts Hastings gelding. Priscilllan, six years old this year, is still in the Ilildreth barn and he is probably the biggest horse in training. He stands lG.2i on his plates and weighs more than 1,100 pounds, and if it were not for a crooked hind leg ho would be a thing of "beauty. Joe Madden, the son of Yankee and Tarantella, whose name topped the winning list two seasons back, was of little use last year, but he bids fair to train this season. The four-year-old Hampton Court, a son of Galore and Dorothy Hampton, although a horse of lighter mould, is not unlike. King James in general cut. The resemblance between the two Is enhanced by the circumstance that both the Plaudit six-year-old and the Galore four-year-old have lop years. He looks better than ever, Mr. Ilildreth is confident that Fayette, the Option Saratoga Belle colt he bought from John. Madden two years ago, will race again, notwithstanding when Fayette broke down at Aqueduct last spring it did not look as though there was a chance for him. No one would ever suspect, to look at Fayettes tendons now, that anything was ever amiss with one of them, Firestones legs are as good as they ever were, and his coat has the rich, snappy gloss which indicates perfect condition. It will not bo long after Mr. Ilildreth gets him galloping until he is ready for a race. .Montgomery and Restigouche are other mature horses In the Ilildreth "string that seem to have held their own in appearance in spite of their advancing years. Eddie Dugan, the Magazan colt that broke down last season when he was Just beginning to flatter his owner, is a prepossessing four-year-old of the English type. Mr. Ilildreth Is confident Eddie Dugan will train successfully this season. Mr. lllldreths Kormak cannot be called a big colt, but lie has improved all around. Kormak weighs probably 920 pounds and stands 15.24 on his plates. He is developing good depth of chest and has tine, straight hind legs. Kormak probably was not cut out for great things, but his trainer has a notion tfint he will beat the best three-year-old platers In the country over a distance of ground Royal Meteor, a Star Shoot Queen Regent colt that Mr. Ilildreth purchased last season at Saratoga, principally because he was a half-brother to the Hindoo colt. Searcher, with which he won a Club Members Handicap at St. Louis many years ago, has improved vastly over winter. Mr. Ilildreth has an idea that Royal Meteor will do better this year than he did last, lie was ailing pretty ranch up to the time the Newcastle Stable .sold him.
