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The Stock Farms of Kentucky By W S VOSBURGH IV THE NURSERY STUD It was a bright and pleas History of the nnt afternoon when we visit Nursery cd the Nursery Stud of Major August Belmont The cold winds had abated and rendered our inspection of the fathers of the maroon and red bat ¬ talion under more favorable conditions than had generally obtained It was in 1885 that the elder August Belmont located in Ken ¬ tucky he having previously bred his racers at his estate near Babylon Long Island He had begun as early as 1868 collecting a few mares and in that year purchased the fa ¬ mous racer Kentucky for stud purposes In 1870 he had acquired Kingfisher Thus he had as stallions two sons of Lexington The Lexingtons had from I860 to 1875 carried all before them on the race course and every ¬ one expected they would continue in the second generation But by a strange fatality none of the sons of Lexington succeeded as a sire of the first rank rankAt At the time Mr Belmont had a highly tried race horse in Glenelg but at that time he was so impressed as were most people with the great future of the sons of Lex ¬ ington as sires that he sold Glenelg to Mr M H Sanford and soon found he had sold the wrong horse Kentucky sired some good performers but none of the first class King ¬ fisher sired one good colt in Prince Royal but all his best were fillies Then Mr Bel ¬ mont began all over again by sending his mares to a Kentucky farm and importing tne Epsom Derby winner St Blaise BlaiseThat That horse in his first firstThe The Stud Fathers two seasons here was u brilliant success but after that failed utterly The 111 Used sired a great twoyearold performer in His High ¬ ness which failed as a stayer Upon the death of his father in 1890 Major Belmont saved enough mares to continue the stud and purchased the French horse Rayon dOr which had made a great name in Pennsyl ¬ vania where he sired Tenny Banquet Chaos etc Soon after he was joined by Hastings and Henry of Navarre the latter a peerless racer but an absolute failure as a sire while Hastings proved one of the best sires of his generation In 190G Major Belmont purchased the Derby and St Leger winner Rock Sand for stud duty and upon his return from Kngland Fair play joined Rock Sand and upon the sale of the latter Fair Play became premier stallion of the Nursery It had been expected that Tracery would be recalled from England but in that country stallions could command service fees so greatly in excess of those paid here that he remained on the scene of his triumphs Meantime the black horse Hourless had taken the field and in view of the plenitude of Rock Sand mares the Nursery possessed Major Belmont probably thinking Hourless more useful than Tracery which was also by Rock Sand sold Tracery and Hourless was retired to divide with Fair Play the pre ¬ miership of the Nursery which is under the management of Mrs Kane KaneThe The entire aspect of the Nurs Mrs Kane crv may be summed up in the word practical The buildings are good but unpretentious no George and Garter dangling from the bed no tawdry ornamentation A coat of yellow paint gave evidence of its freshness and everything was in keeping with the taster of its owner rich not gaudy A flock of exquisitely barred Plymouth Rock hens that would make Ed Thompson Victor Bradley Charles Latham or any of the barred Ply ¬ mouth Rock fanciers open their eyes roamed around the stables to prove that Mrs Kane was a devotee of Americas great general purpose fowl At other farms the lordly game fowl was more in evidence More sportinglike perhaps but Mrs Kane is not given to affectation She is a woman of more deliberate speech than ordinarily marks her PCX As the other sex for that matter especially those identified with rac ¬ ing many of them talk like maniacs Such is their anxiety to talk that they have no time to listen Even then their talk is not the result of conclusions at which they ar ¬ rive through the process of reasoning but of impulse expressed in the common remarks of everyday use the mere echo of com ¬ monplace proverbs She has charge of the farm and is not only wellinformed on the subject of breeding race horses but is so affable and obliging that a visitor at the Nursery comes away with a pleasant im ¬ pression pressionFair Fair Plays white reach ap Fair Play at reared over the halfdoor to re Home mind us of other days Alert Alertquick quick and inquisitive he seemed to reciprocate our attentions He has changed little despite his seventeen years and it was thirteen since we had seen him He was growing pretty gay then and in England he became so much so as to compel his return home His sire Hastings was no angel of kindness His grandsire Spendthrift we knew very well and a sweeter tempered horse never carried silk Taking the record we consider Fair Play the most successful sire of the day To have sired Man o Wai was glory enough but Mad Hatter Sporting Blood Stromboli Dunlin Chatterton and Messenger are additional evidence His progeny have a characteristic which it is usual to claim as lacking in most horses stamina They can cover distance at high speed Sporting Blood is a conspicuous in ¬ stance His dam Felicity was from the Fil lagree family a family of nonstayers We can remember Fillagrees daughter Finesse in 1SC9 a nonstayer The others Fine work in 74 Fiddlestick in 7G Filettte in 81 Fides in 90 all nonstayers yet Fides daughter Felicity bred to Fair Play pro Iuced in Sporting Blood a real stayer stayerThe The above proves the influence of a sire as opposed to the influence of the dam We have heard people doubt the future success of Man o War as a sire on the ground that his dams immediate family never pro ¬ duced a great sire Neither had Dominos and Hamburgs nor Hanovers until they appeared Neither had Orbys until you go back to Muscovite and The Promised Land and they were not of the highest class Take the case of Hurry On He traces through a lot of unnamed mares in old Sir Tatton Skyes stud at Sledmere and except Mask and Sheen the line never bred a sire of note until n hundred years back and then Grey Momus was the best Yet Hurry On now only ten years old sired the winner of last years Derby and his son Town Guard is favorite for the coming Derby You can go to the Stud Book and prove or disprove any theory I short you can find in the Stud Book whatever you want to find findThe The fine Roman head The Black Horse of Hourless with its white spot which horse ¬ men call a star but is in shape of a crescent emerged from his box next to Fair Plays We had not seen the big black since that day in 17 when his sun set in splendor with his defeat of Omar Khayyam It re ¬ called the incidents of that day the Im ¬ mense crowd the excitement the sudden change of jockeys almost at the last min ¬ ute Omar Khayyam throwing up his heels going reluctantly to the post as if he had a premonition of defeat Then Robinson lying away while Omar made the pace until the stretch when he shot to the front like a rocket and won Hourless unlike Fair Play was as calm as a summers morning as he was led out and gazed about him with the composure of a wellbred gentleman He has filled out but we liked his appearance better when in condition He was probably the best of his year yet there was very lit ¬ tle to choose between him arid Omar Khay ¬ yam which defeated him for the Realization by the narrowest margin after a bad ride in which Butwell lost his whip In his first season at the stud Hourless has established a reputation as the sire of Lucky Hour That colts pedigree is given as by Ferrol or Hourless but all indications make Hour less the real sire the corespondent who disturbed Ferrols domestic happiness happinessGreat Great horse though he was Hourless had his peculiarities He could not race in heavy ground and he was not a quick beginner in each instance due to the fact that he had a tremendous stride In mud such horses slip become frightened and shorten their stride Even in dry going their great stride does not settle down until they have gone some distance Hourless wasnt as quick at the start as Omar Khayyam said Frank j Robinson his jockey but I didnt hurry him I let him get into his stride until the last quarter when I let Hourless have his head and he closed Omar Khayyam answered Haynes call but when I heard Haynes cluck to him I knew my horse had him beaten Omar was taking two strides to every one Hourless took tookMirabelle Mirabelle the pretty prettyMan Man 0 Wars Dam twoyearold sister to Man o War which we had seen race at Yonkers recently had re ¬ turned to the farm looking none the worse for her brief campaign She is lacking in the substance of Mahubahs colts and is a highheaded filly Mahubah herself was brought out for a look over A whole colored blocky mare well made and evi ¬ dently a good milker as her colts bear evi ¬ dence of great nourishment Fair Plays white face appeared over the half door of his stable as Mahubah was led out He seemed to recognize immediately his consort in the production of the great Man o War and when the mare was led away gave utterance to sounds suggestive of feelings more easily imagined than described describedTwo Two recent additions to the Yokohama Nursery Stud were shown in Pasta and the imported mares Pasta and andYokohama Yokohama purchased at the Newmarket sales in July last Yokohama a bay 1911 is a daughter of Santoi from Spring Chicken by Gallinule and was bred to Pommem She was a good performer win ¬ ning the Southfield Plate one and onehalf miles and was second for the Newmarket Oaks She is of good size but we prefer Pasta a black 1912 by Thrush from Signor inetta winner of the Derby 1908 by Char lereux granddam of St Simon Her sire Thrush is a son of Missel Thrush son of Orme by Ormonde Pasta is a very superior mare in appearance She was purchased with a filly foal by Lcmberg for 5200 guineas and was bred to Gay Crusader Our limited time compelled us to forego an inspection of the Nursery mares which are Major Bel inonts chief delight He prides himself upon retaining strains which have been in the possession of his family for more than fifty years such as the descendants of Lady Blessington Fleur des Champs Sultana and Patience The Marians the Aerolites the Levitys and the Cinderellas may come and go the fame of the Lexingtons the Glenelg the Alarm and the Hamburg mares may be on every lip and men may talk of the future of the Ultimus fillies as brood mares but to Major Belmont the old blood is an article of faith faithIn In his admirable chapters Disraeli from turf history New NewOH OH Breeding market tells us that in 1875 the late Mr Disraeli Lord Reaconsfield wrote to Lady Bradford Tell Bradford I cannot understand why a great noble with his brains and knowledge of horses does not command the turf I dont want him to have a great stable but I want him to have a famous one that he should at any rate obtain some first rate blood and then carefully and sedulously breed from it as Rothschild did with King Tom I saw the beginning of his plan at Mentmore and people turned up their noses at his scneme and his sire for a while and yet eventually that blood gave him the Derby the Oaks and the St Leger in one year I should like lo see that done at dear V eston estonIt It would appear that Lord Bradford fol ¬ lowed the advice in recruiting his Weston Stud for he purchased the mare Quick March a full sister of Vedette and bred her carefully and sedulously as he did from the other mares he acquired Quick March in time foaled thit excellent racer Retreat also the filly Manoeuvre which he retained and in 1SS9 she bred him Sir Hugo which won the Derby of 92 and thus from the Disraeli tip Lord Bradford attained the highest pinnacle of racing fame fameWe We are not aware that thatThe The Old Blood Disraeli also favored Major Belmont with advice but he has conducted the Nursery upon the same carefully and sedulously principle adher ¬ ing to strains which had proved their excel ¬ lence under his own colors Mad Hatter Stromboli Fair Play Norman Vulcain Lady Violet Octagon Friar Rock Rock View Bel ¬ dame etc The Finns second third and fourth dams Woodray Wood Nymph and Woodbine were all bred by the Nursery Stud and from the old blood that of Fleur des Champs by Newminster Her daughter Woodbine was the best threeyearold filly of 72
