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AS WE APPEAB TO A F0BEIGN VISIT0B. Impressions of Our Racing Customs Gained by an English Authority at the Lexington Meeting. Lexington. Ky., May C. — A highly -interested and delightfully -interesting visitor to the races here just now. is Edward Moorhouse, of London. Mr. Moorhouse is a director of the British Bloodstock Agency of London. editor of the Bloodstock Brooders Review, was for many years Special Commissioner of The Sporting Life and before that sporting editor of the Fall Mall Gazette; is the author of "The History and Uomance of the Derby," and is a Follow of the Institute of Journalists. He has lieon going about among the breeding farms in this section, as much as unfavorable weather permitted during the past ten days, and each afternoon has boon a guest of the Kentucky Association at the races. While ho was seated in Arthur 15. Hancocks box yesterday afternoon, Mr. Moorhouse was interrogated as to the chief purpose of his -visit to this country and this inquiry was succeeded by others, until the following interview was produced: "It is to meet the leading men associated with bloodstock thoroughbred horses, to study their aims and the means by which they are striving to attain the end they have in view, that I have come to the Inited States and to Kentucky." said In-. "I have for many years followed with keen interest racing and breeding developments in this country, but it is one tiling merely to read about such matters anl quite another to get into personal contact with them and. more especially, with the men who have fashioned and are stili fashioning the history of the thoroughbred in this truly wonderful country. I am here as a student — a iearner. I realize that many good and some groat horses have been bred and reared in the United States, and I am convinced that what your breeders of the past have done can be equalled and probably surpassed by the breeders of the present day. "As you know, we in England are pnssing through a trying period. Owing to the war. racing has been cut down to such an extent that the breeding of bloodstock has become a precarious industry. Lot me quote one or two facts by way of emphasizing that statement. In 1913. the last year before the war began, there wore sold at our great Doneastor yearling sales 321 lots for an aggregate of ,007.-290. so that the average yield per yearling was ..4.* 0. That was a record as regards lxith the aggregate and the average. The Doncaster sales in 1914 wore held five weeks after the commencement of the war. On that oceasion 220 vearlings made 74,089, the average being ,245. I-lst autumn the yearling sales were held at Newmarket because there was no racing at Doiicaster and 200 lots wore disposed of for ?2 V .N90. so tiiat the aver-ago was redueed to S0. That meant that nine brooders out of ton wore selling at a loss. Ream of yearlings made less than the covering foe paid by the breeder. Bai as this result was. it would have been infinitely worse but for the competition occasioned by the bidding of commissioners representing wealthy flaw ill ■■ owners. You may be sure we in England will follow racing in the States during the next year or two with the liveliest interest. You have not imported the best thoroughbred stock that England and Ireland can produce, but you havo certainly secured a good sample. "The broodmares and stallions brought to this country have been selected judiciously for Cue most part. Ex-Senator Camden. Mr. Arthur Ii. Hancock. Mr. John Sanford. Mr. E. R. Bradley. Mr. 11. T. Oxnard, Mr. Price McKinney and one or two •then have appreciably strengthened their studs by recent purchases. It would not be becoming of mo to discuss now the pros and cons of the question whether the American thoroughbred is as great a proposition as the pure British thoroughbred. I hope. I have no prcdjudioos in regard to that matter. Anyway. I am prepared to admit that the American thoroughbred is not the pariah which some pe ipl- try to make out. My respect for the species has been intensified during the last few days. bet me say this, however. You will never make the headway in this country that you ought to do until you pay much greater attention to long-dist.inee racing. It seems to sac that you carry the glorifi cation of speed to a needless extreme. One of our English racing rules stipulates that there must 1m- at least one contest each day over a distance not loss than a mile and a half, and ether rates tend to curb the hankerinu after sprinting. Even so. I have long been of the opinion that wo might with advantage go much further in the direction of encouraging stamina. The first and last aim of racing should be to improve the breed of banes by affording a oonclusive test of their merits. If it merely results in the production of racing m.i-ehines whose lungs are clogged after they have covered three-quarters of a mile, the sport is of little or no practical service and lieeomes simply an amusement. A horse which can win over a mile and a quarter in good class company, carrying a substantial weight, is, in my opinion the animal calculated to get the right kind of stock. Bla offspring will, in all probability, include both sprinter and stayers by rcasi.n of the segregation of heritable characters in accordance with the Mendelian law. "What do I think of American racing? The Lexington meeting is so far the only one I have attended on this continent. To me. accustomed to the expansive Heath at Newmarket and the spacious tracks at Aaeat, Goodwood. Doncaster and other places that might be named, the Lexington track seems very small and trappy. On such a course luck must play an unduly big part — luck and jock-eyship. Of rearse, joekeyship is an essential ingredient of racing, but racing can be ideal only when ail the horses are given equal chances, and that essential is unobtainable in sprints in which the eompetitors have to negotiate a sharp turn like that at Lexington and when the final straight is only about a QSnttter. I have notieed that in the majority of races here the horse that wins has generally been first or second at the turn into the straight. There are not the chops and changes wo see in England in the last eighth or two on our straight courses, which afford a slow beginner a chance of overcoming his initial disadvantage. Hut let me say I have greatly enjoyed the racing at Lexington. I have seen many good-looking horses, especially among the two-year-olds, and I have made the acquaintance of some fine sportsmen. The camaraderie which animates the meeting is most notieoahle. it is a spirit we find in Ireland much more than in England. "Allow mo to arid a wcrd tilxjut the pari-niutuol form of betting. 1 have been an ardent advocate of the totalizator over since I first became aeon, luted with it some twelve years ago in Paris. It is the one and only solution id betting troubles. Some of us an doing our utmost to secure its adopt im: in England and I am glad to say that the attention of our legislators is at this motnei.t being 1 directed to the advantages of the pari-mutuel as a revenue producer. Dotting is not a crime and Be amount of legislation can cosmct it into one. We Britishers have hitherto adopted a Pharisaical attitude toward betting: but the war has made mincemeat of many shibboleths and grandmotherly ideas. II has caused us to take more common s, use Hews. We want a pile of money to beta horse lirci-dilli: along. The pari iuiltu-1 will fiirni h all that b ded and leave a hanl-iine surplus to be de ote.i to ether ass thy object-. Nothiag is aat certain that that one. of the first laws passed by the Irish parliament that is to come into being six months after the war is over will be one legalizing the pari-mutuel in the Green Isle." T. B. CROMWELL.
