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Here and There on the Turf New York Season Closes. Juveniles in Mile Races. Stings Impressive Win. Maryland Innovations. With the only remaining racing thatrwill be served up to the New York devotees the two days sport of the United Hunts Racing Association at Belmont Park Saturday and the following Tuesday, there comes to a close one of the most remarkable seasons in the history of the American turf. While the sport of the United Hunts Association is of great importance, it is sport fathered and sanctioned by the National Steeplechase and Hunt Association rather than the Jockey Club, so that the flat racing season came to a conclusion with the running off of the program of the Empire City Racing Association Wednesday at Yonkers. Many things have contributed to make the season a remarkable one for the sport, and it will probably be longer remembered for the first running of an international match when Harry F. Sinclairs Zev took the measure of Ben Irishs Papyrus, the Epsom Derby winner, at Belmont Park October 20. As a matter of cold fact it was only the international flavor that gave the race any importance at all. As a spectacle it was a miserable failure, for it was no contest. The track was not in a condition to give the English celt a chance to show to his best advantage, and, while he had bezn brought up to the running with trials that seemed to give him a royal winning chance, he failed utterly to race up to the trials with colors up. The most ardent admirer of Zev that intelligently followed the training of both colts before the running of the race is forced to admit that Papyrus is an infinitely better colt than his race of October 20 would indicate. It is for that reason that the international race was an utter failure as a test of the quality of the two colts. It was Zevs easiest victory of the year, and it was by long odds the worst race ever run by Papyrus. There surely can be no lingering doubts of the wisdom of mile races for two-year-olds in the fall of the year. These races have come to New York this season for the first time, and I thsy have undoubtedly come to stay. There have been frequent races for all ages at such a distance that have been won over the New York tracks, but it remained for this season i to see the first offering of staler exclusively for the juveniles over the mile distance. The i two that have been put on brought about excellent contests, and there was further evidence of the adaptability of the two-year-olds to race a mile in the running of the Eclipse i Handicap at Yonkers Tuesday. In that running James Butlers home-bred Sting, a two-year-old son of Spur Gnat, took the measure i of as good an old horse as Frigate, with H. . P. Whitneys Dazzler, another juvenile, finishing third in front of the three-year-olds ; Miss Cerina, Peddler and Paula Shay. I i i i i . ; In this race the two-year-olds gave aw3y weight on the scale, for each was five pounds over the scale. Frigate carried four pounds over scale weight. Paula Shay was seven pounds below the scale and both Miss Cerina and Peddler were in receipt of fifteen pounds on the scale. Thus it is shown that the two-year-olds gave away from one pound to Frigate all the way to twenty pounds to both Miss Cerina and Peddler. If the scale is right the two-year-olds surely belong in mile races in the fall. At the Laurel meeting of the Maryland State Fair Association, which came to such a successful close last week, there were many innovations that were of great convenience to both the horsemen and the racing public. L. A. Cassidy, resident manager for the association, filled his arduous office in a manner that accounted for a full measure of the success that was deserved. There were many of the conveniences for the horsemen and the public that did not really appear on the surface, though they all counted in the racing success. It was Cassidy that brought about the printing of the names of the jockeys on the race programs, and in that alone a big step forward was made. This has been a Kentucky con-! venience for some time, so that it did not originate with Laurel, but it is now a Maryland program feature that has been taken up by the Maryland Jockey Club at Pimlico. Doubtless the other tracks will follow suit, for it is of great value. In New York the fact that the entries do not close until 2 oclock in the afternoon pre-i eludes any chance for such convenience over the tracks of the Jockey Club, though it would be an improvement that would be greatly ap- predated. There does not appear to be any good reason for the late closing of the New York entries, but, like many of the other New York regulations, the old ones are adhered to with a subborn disregard for the progress that has been made in every other turf center.
