PROVIDING REMOUNTS
MR. J. B. HARCOURT'S VIEWS,
. Referring to the question of providing hbrsos suitable for remounts, Mr. J. B. Harcourt, president of tho Wellington Racing Club, made some interesting remarks in the course of his address to mombers at the annual meeting last night. He said: "When I addressed you this' time last year I called attention to the .necessity for the oncouragement of the breeding of horses suitable for remount purposes. 1 may say that, although president of your club, i_ havo personally no financial interest in any racehorse or breeding establishment of any kind whatever, 1 take an absolutely impartial view, and my only object in addressing you as 1 am doing is to emphasise the common sunse view whichan ordinary man, who is , cognisant of both sidos of the question, is compelled to tako. When 1 addressed you last year on this remount question,' I little thought that within two months it would bo necessary for the preservation of Jaw and order to provide in this city a mounted force ol 10U0 men; —a force, by the way, whose services would have been greatly dis-. counted but for tho fact that they were mounted, and splendidly mounted. And what do we find.to-day? Our nation is engaged in a war which, should it go against us, would lnoan the end, once and for all. of the British Empire. Those of you who witnessed the march tnrough the city of the Field Artillery must havo been-Btruck with the calibre of the horses, and of the absolute necessity of our Forces being in possession of the best possible mounts. Our I men are going '■ away with horses of which wo may well be proud, and you will agree with-me that it is ever necessary to continue to maintain the. supply. During the discussion in Parliament upon Mr. Hunter's Gaming Amendment Bill, referenco was made regarding tho concentration of racing in tho large centres. It must bo-ap-paropt to any thoughtful man that, as Mr. Hindiuarsh so plainly put it in tho House, it the breeding of high-class horses is to bo encouraged, and the importation of the requisite strains effected, richly-endowed races provide the alltaportant factor. Metropolitan clubs, owing to the proximity of dense population, are enabled to give substantial prizes to win which breeders are not afraid to spend large sums of money in procuring tho best horses from other countries.
"We quite realise tho importance of, and the pleasure given by country racing clubs, but the'requirements of the country as a whole in regard to highclass horseflesh necessitate substantial stakes, which it has always been the aim of the metropolitan clubs to provide. To the totalisator, and the totalisator alone, is due the'importation of high-class strains, from which, we at present obtain our supply. Fortunately, our public men, or, * at any rate, a large majority of them, are alive to the advantages of the machine, the only disadvantage being the everlasting wail from people whose vision is nearly always circumscribed, iabout the encouragement of gambling. Gambling in some form or other enters into every phase.of life,.it is impossible to eliminate it, and ic is fortunate for us and for those who do not see eye to eye with us, that at the present moment wo have in the North Sea men who are prepared to gamble with their lives to maintain the existence and the worldpower of the great and glorious British Empire to which we belong. Gentlemen, our club is doing its share bo iar as it can, some of our members have gone to the front with the Forces, and I venture to assert that all tho men who have gone are patrons of our sport. When the bugle blows, the , first man into the broach is tho sporting , man, game to take a risk, and game to di so and die, and long may it continue. Financially, we have done what we can, wo have given the sum of £1000 to the War Fund, and I am sure our action meets with your emphatic approval."
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Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2268, 30 September 1914, Page 7
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680PROVIDING REMOUNTS Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2268, 30 September 1914, Page 7
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