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AS A MAN FROM ABROAD VIEWS US. Pen Pictures of Our Greatest Breeding Farms by a Competent English Writer. Last spring Mr. Edward Moorhouse. one of the editors of that admirable turf publication, The Bloodstock Breeders Review, came to this country and spent some time in inspection of our leading thoroughbred breeding establishments and in witnessing some of our racing. Returning to England he put his impressions into a comprehensive article in the Breeders Review. His description of our bloodstock nurseries is so well told and so full of information of decided interest, that Daily Racing Form will lay it before its readers in a series of installments, of which the following is tlie first. First Installment. A visit to the United States, extending over a period of six weeks, has endowed me with a bewildering variety of impressions. Not until this moment, when I take my pen in hand for the purpose of conveying to readers of tlie Review some idea of the achievements, aims and ideals of those who are breeding, rearing and racing thoroughbreds in America, have I fully realized how exceptional were the opportunities that came my way. Everywhere I received the heartiest of greetings. Overwhelming in its spontaneity and generosity was the hospitality vouchsafed me. And yet to all but a very few of the people I met I came as a stranger, known to them by name only. If I live to be a nonagenarian I can never hope to repay tlie kindness showered upon me. Wore proof required of the bond of sympathy that exists between American and British sportsmen, it is to be found in this manifestation of a desire to make my sojourn in the United States an occasion crowded with pleasing and happy memories. More than once it was borne in upon me that I was regarded in some sense as an ambassador, representing the breeding interests of England and Ireland. I need hardly say I scrupulously avoided tlie encouragement of that conception of my mission. At the same time the very fact that such a notion was entertained was significant of the community of interests that exists between us and them. We are in the midst of a struggle against conditions terribly adverse to tlie prosperity of breeders of bloodstock; our American confreres are just emerging from a prolonged period of stress and difficulty. Our mutual sufferings constitute a strong bond of sympathy. American breeders sought, and in some measure obtained, assistance from us when, eight years ago, drastic legislation brought them face to face witli disaster. They, in their turn, are now holding out a helping hand. English and Irish breeders have reasons to be grateful for the purchases made by Americans at last years sales. Their operations went a long way towards holding the market together. I am not suggesting that the elements of charity enters into these transactions. But this I will say: One hears no querulous grumblings among American breeders because men, accustomed to buying their yearlings, have freely spent money on youngsters bred in England or Ireland. When American yearlings were being sold by the score at Newmarket some years ago, the Jockey Club was frenziedly urged to devise some method of stopping the importations. I contended at tlie time that that agitation was the product of a dog-in-the-manger spirit. Those who engineered it must now realize that their conduct was not only foolish, but mischievous. If they have not long since felt heartily ashamed of themselves it is quite time they did. American breeders have not yet forgotten the endeavors that were unfile to hamper them in the hour of their distress, but they hear no resentment. The cult of the thoroughbred Is every day becoming more and more a matter of international concern. Britain is still the fountain head. Let us see to it that it so. remains, the while rejoicing over tlie progress that may be made in lands across the seas. Such progress inevitably makes for the greater prosperity of the industry in this country. I had been in New York barely twenty-four hours when a visitor called at my hotel to see me. It was William L. Powers, of tlie Powers-Hunter Company, whose privilege it is to conduct the most important of the bloodstock sales in America. I was not aware that Mr. Powers knew of me, or of my arrival. As a matter of fact, it was a communication lie received from Kentucky that enlightened him. He at once set to work to ascertain my whereabouts, and it was only after the pursuit of a long trail that he discovered my lair. His persistence was indicative of the determination of Americans with whom I came in personal contact to make my stay in that country as agreeable as possible. Within the next day or two I was introduced by Mr. Powers to many prominent men in New York associated with breeding and racing. Among them were Henry T. Oxnard, W. II. Howe tlie registrar of the Stud Book and J. Temple Gwathmey. It was under the guidance of Mr. Powers that I visited the first of the many studs inspected in tlie course of my travels. This was II. I. Whitneys farm at Brookdale, X. J. Crossing the Hudson river by the ferry, we took train at Jersey City for Red Bank, an hours run away. Then came a five-mile drive in a motor car through prettily-wooded country. James Rowe, known to all and sundry as Jimmy, was awaiting us at his office, and without more ado we went away to see the yearlings. It was a glorious spring day. The atmosphere was brilliantly clear and delightfully bracing. I was, and felt, highly favored. In the course of conversation, I learned that the Brookdale Stud was founded some thirty-five or forty years ago by the late D. 1. Withers. After his death the property wos bought by Colonel William P. Thompson, who maintained the stud and himself raced tlie animals he bred there. It "was at that time that Mr. Rowe first became associated with Brookdale, for he was appointed trainer to the Colonel, and a very successful association it was. Among other notable achievements, he prepared three winners of the Futurity Stakes in Requital, LAIouette and Chacornac, their years being 1S95, 1S97 and 1S99. After Colonel Thompsons deatli the property passed to sons, who leased the farm, with its training track and quarters, to the late James R. Keene. The latter made use of Brookdale solely as a training establishment, for he already had his stud farm at Castleton, in Kentucky. From Mr. Keene the tenancy was transferred to Harry P. Whitney, who botli breeds and trains his horses there. Mr. Rowe controls the whole establishment, and it follows that he does not find time hang heavily on his hands. He is one of the outstanding personalities on the American turf. Many people look upon him as a veritable wizard in the handling of race horses. His reputation as a trainer is the highest possible. Sometimes he must find it inconveniently high, for the public are apt to expect him to do unachievable things. Like most great men, he is extremely unassuming. He thinks a lot but says little. That, at any rate, is supposed to be one of his characteristics. I am bound to say, however, that I found him a most charming and affable companion, even though information concerning his own accomplishments had to be dragged forth by a close cross-examination as wo went tlie round of the paddocks and barns. There are 800 acres of paddock land at Brookdale. One of the fields runs to 130 acres. It is set apart for the use of the broodmares during the summer months. Most of the paddocks are forty to fifty acres in extent, but there are a few smaller ones. Generally speaking, the grass is very good, though much better on one side of the farm than the other. I may say here that during my travels I found that vegetation, both east and west, was unusually backward. Mr. Rowe said that at Brookdale it was about a month late. In Virginia and Kentucky it was claimed that the season was three weeks behind its normal time. The fact is that in the United States they had a winter and spring very similar to ours. January was an exceptionally warm month as with us. Then came a long spell of severe weather, which retarded the growth of grass and the budding of trees. When I returned to New York, towards the end of May, its inhabitants complained that they had not yet enjoyed a really warm day this year. It came tlie day before I sailed for Liverpool on the twenty-seventh. Down in Kentucky I had, however, experienced a sample of summer weather in America, for more than once the thermometer registered over eighty-five iii the shade. This sultry temperature enabled me to appreciate the merits of a mint julep for which Kentucky is renowned far and wide. Never shall I forget the long railway journey I took from Louisville to Pittsburgh on Sunday, May 14. I was traveling from eight in the morning to eleven at night, save for a two hours wait in Cincinnati. The heat was most trying and ruffling to ones temper. The two hours spent in Cincinnati was a period of positive torture. When I related my experience to Mr. Oxnard, he gave me no sympathy, but chided me for not dressing to the climate. That is all very well. Apparently one ought to travel in America with a big wardrobe, because within three days of the frizzling I got during that journey through Ohio, I sat shivering over a heating stove in a little town in tlie northwest corner of Pennsylvania, lamenting that my heavy overcoat was in a trunk which I had sent on to New York! One is apt to forget the distances one covers in the United States. Americans think no more of a 500-mile journey than we do of traveling fifty miles. You pass from winter into summer during the night. The seasonal range of temperatures is much greater than with lis. Kentucky is so far south that one had imagined that it had a semi-tropical climate.. In silnimer tlie heat is. indeed, iiltehse. A ther-lnoiuetrical reading of ninety-five degrees is nothing out of the common, yet the times are out of joint if the mercury does not touch zero occasionally during the winter months. But nature in that district responds very quickly to the suns heat which conies witli the spring. By the middle of May the rye was in ear, and before these lines are in print it will have been harvested. In Kentucky the garnering of hay and cereals is practically a simultaneous operation. Let us, however, return to Brookdale. There was a something about the general aspect which seemed strange, but it was not until towards, the end of my visit that I discovered the reason. I missed the quiCk hedges with which our English and Irish paddocks are usually surrounded. In America you see nothing but post-and-rail fences. A growing hedge is so rare that it is at once noticed. It seems to me that American stud masters would be studying their own interests if they were to give their bloodstock the shelter which a hedge so admirably affords. Failing that, they might, with advantage, provide a screen by boarding portions of the fencing on each side of the paddock. I never came across any boarding. Even the stallions are turned into paddocks surrounded with open fences. Not infrequently, as at the Kingston Stud, Lexington, these stallion paddocks adjoin the high road. The idea of cooping a stallion up in a box or a high-walled paddock all day long is anathema to an American stud manager. The aim is to allow horses to enjoy life as much as possible and see something of the world and its inhabitants. It is believed, and I am inclined to think rightly, that horses treated in this way are less liable to become vicious and intractable. Then again, when exercised on tlie roads, stallions in America are almost invariably ridden. Many of them are galloped every day, pretty much as if they were still in training. This is generally the case at farms where there is a properly appointed training track, as at E. R. Bradleys Idle Hour Stud, Lexington. At Brookdale, the stallions, for some weeks before the breeding season begins, cover from fifteen to twenty miles on tlie roads every day; while the season is in progress, exercise is limited to eight or ten miles. During the summer months they spend eacli day in smali paddocks divided by post sand rails. That they thrive on this treatment was made abundantly evident to me when they were brought forth for inspection. There are four of them Broomstick, his son Whisk Broom, Peter Pan and All Gold. My pick of the bunch was Whisk Broom. With the sun shining on his rich chestnut coat, he made a splendid picture. He had countless admirers when he was winning races for Mr. Whitney in England, and he gained many more when he returned to the United States, where he won all the events in which he competed, carrying big weights. Broomstick, by Ben Brush whom I afterwards saw at Mr. Camdens stud in Kentucky, is also a fine typo of horse, which has been a conspicuous success as. a sire. He is only fifteen years old, so that with ordinary luck he should have many seasons of usefulness still ahead of him. His daughter. Regret, won the Kentucky Derby last year, and in Thunderer own brother to Regret he has a colt which displayed brilliant form last season as a two-year-old, and which is expected to do big things before the present season terminates. Tlie dam of Regret and Thunderer is Jersey Lightning, by Hamburg. Mr. Whitney has out of her a two-year-old colt named Vivid by his Persimmon horse All Gold; but Jersey Lightning, which was this season again mated with Broomstick, has neither foal nor yearling. By some mischance I missed seeing her. Commandos son, Peter Pan, is a big and powerful bay horse. Mr. Rowe told us that when in training, Peter Pan required a tremendous amount of work to get him fit. Two good races he might have won were lost because it was impossible to get him ready in time. Even so. lie earned his corn and a bit over on the race course. All Gold is getting some good chances at Brookdale. By Persimmon out of Dame d Or, lie was bred in 1008 by Russell Swanwick at Cirencester. Mr. Whitney gave 2,000 guineas for him as a yearling at the Newmarket July sales. He is a chestnut, and in this and other ways favors his maternal ancestry rather than his sires. The first of his get are now two-year-olds. I saw some good foals and yearlings by him. Several of Mr. Whitneys mares were covered by English stallions last season and then shipped to America. I came across foals by Cylgad, Tracery, St. Amant, Greenback and St. Victrix. They all looked very promising. It follows, therefore, that what with these youngsters, others that were also foaled in the United States, and tlie yearlings bought in this country last year, English and Irish breeders will have a large interest in American racing during the next few seasons. Americans themselves look forward with pleasure to the rivalry which these importations will create. Ardent admirers, as they naturally are of the best of homebred products, they are not blind to the eventual benefit which these "aliens" will bring in their train. It is all a part of the renaissance of the American thoroughbred which we are now "witnessing, a blending of the old remnant with vivifying blood. It was at Brookdale that I saw for the first time a dirt track. Mr. Rowe trains Mr. Whitneys horses on an oval course a mile in circumference. There are many such race courses in America, and none, I venture to say, is kept in better order than the one at Brookdale. To anyone accustomed, as I have been, to seeing racing only on grass, these dirt tracks seem at first sight an abomination, but it is surprising how quickly one gets used to them. Long before I came away, having seen racing many days at Lexington, and afterwards at Louisville and Belmont Park, I was almost reconciled to the dust or the mud, according to the state of the weather. At Lexington I saw the track fast, sloppy and sticky by turns. Its slopplness one or two days was positively appalling, and one commiserated with the jockeys who passed the winning post plastered with dirt from head to foot. As race meetings are arranged in America these dirt tracks are Inevitable. Racing proceeds de die in diem for perhaps a fortnight, and it is obvious that a grass course, no matter how carefully tended, would not stand the hard wear it would receive during so prolonged a period. A dirt track, on the other hand, is harrowed and rolled between races, and always presents a fair surface. It is, however, an unyielding surface. Every yearling, or nearly every one, that goes into training in the autumn has to pass through the ailment known as "bucking." This is Americanese for sore shins. English and Irish breeders may think that this is a matter of purely local concern. In reality it touches them. Yearlings brought here in the autumn or late summer for exportation to the States cannot be put into training that season, because by the time they get across the Atlantic and have overcome the effects of the voyage, wintry weather has put a stop to training operations. I am assuming that the buyer is not prepared to incur the additional expense of sending his imported yearlings to South Carolina or Georgia to be trained luring the winter. One patron of the American turf, who was concerned in an important group of yearlings oought at Newmarket last autumn, told me very positively that he would not buy yearlings over here this season unless he could get what lie wanted at the July sales. I was also given to understand in other quarters that the purchase of yearlings in July would suit American owners ami trainers much better than acquirements in September. This hint may be of service to some of our breeders, because it may be that for several more years the supply of American-bred yearlings will not meet the demands of American racing men. Before Mr. Powers and I left Brookdale, "afternoon stables" was on and we went the round of the boxes "with Mr. Rowe. He has a fine looking lot of horses under his care, and it may safely be assumed that before the Saratoga meeting in August has run its course, Mr. Whitneys name will once more occupy a prominent place in the winning owners list. Like the majority of American trainers, Mr. Rowe relies entirely on colored servants in his stable. He not only finds them more amenable to discipline, but experience has shown him, as it has other trainers, that horses seem to prefer darkies. After spending a week in New York and the neighborhood, I proceeded to Washington on Good Friday. Early the following Sunday morning I met Mr. Oxnard, by appointment, at the splendid new Union Station, not far from the Capitol. It is not necessary or desirable that I should incorporate in this article any of my sight-seeing experiences, though I confess I am finding it rather difficult to resist the temptation to wander away froin the path I have to follow. I must, however, just say that on the Saturday morning I attended a sitting of the House 61 Representatives in the Capitol, and listened for a while to a more or less edifying debate on the subject of bugs! An appropriation for agriculture was under discussion. Perhaps I had better explain that in America germs are frequently referred to as bugs. To be continued.
