SPORTING NEWS.

Te Aroha News, Volume VII, Issue 462, 12 April 1890, Page 6

SPORTING NEWS.

BY HIPPONA. Mr J. Scott, of Maori football fame, was yesterday elected a licensed bookmaker by the Committee of Auckland Tabtorsall s Club. . « , , Returned visitors from Napier say Patchwork would have won both the Park Cup and City Stakes had he been ridden by a man. , . , Medallion and Scots Grey have arrived back in Christchurch. Mason accompanied the colts, and is slowly recovering from his recent illness. Derretb recently made an application to the Committee of the Dunedin Jockey Club for some mitigation of the sentence of disqualification he received for disobedience to the starter at the Club’s Autumn Meeting, bub the Committee declined to review the decision of the stewards. Referring to the departure of Gatling for Sydney, the “ Canterbury Times ” of last week says : —“He will,ive are sure,with ordinary luck, show himself one of the very best of the season’s two-year-olds. In a rough trial afewdays ago he beat Hazeland Freedom with a good deal in hand, and as the last-named showed passable form at Dunedin, the winner must be pretty good.^ A writer in the Hawke’s Bay “ Herald ’ thinks St. Andrew very little better than Aronoel. If his judgment is correct, Aronoel is an uncommonly smart filly. The Dunedin-owned jumper Waitangi is to be taken across to Melbourne for the V.R.C. Steeplechase Meeting. Mr W. Walters has received from Sydney an offer of £3OO for Leorina. A cablegram of yesterday’s date says : Wagering over the Sydney Gold Cup is at a standstill, pending the acceptances on Thursday. Carbine remains favourite at 5 to 2. Oakleigh has been scratched for the Cup. The stallion Louis d’Or, by TraducerRupee, has been taken to Nelson by Mr H. Redwood, who intends to use him in place of King Cole, who, ibis thought, will not survive another season of stud duties. Katinka broke down in both forelegs while running in .the Hawke’s Bay Cup, and was consequently scratched for all engagements at Napier Park. Kotuku was also scratched for all engagements at the same meeting, and she is to be treated to a spell. Recluse is turned out, and “ Spectator fears it is very improbable that he will be seen out again for a long term. The Napier Park Club made a profit of £7OO over their meeting last week. The sum of £1,216 was paid away in stakes, the leading winners being : —Mr W. Somerville—Hilda, Napier Cup, £2lB 10s ; Hon. Captain W. R. Russell—Aronoel, Sapling Stakes and Two-year-old Stakes, £142 10s, and Eileen, Selling Race, £57 ; Mr D. Hepburn—Cynical, City Stakes, £l7l ; Mr vY. Tatham—Uranus, Second Hurdles, and Man Friday, Waverley Stakes, £152 ; Mr J. Munn —Waterfall, Hurdle Race, and Strephon, Flying Handicap, £l7l ; Mr D. McKinnon—Loch Ness, 2nd in Flying Handicap, £9los ;Mr W. Bobbett —Patchwork, 2nd in Cup and 2nd in City Stakes, £3B. Writes “ Spectator ” :—“ lb may not be generally known that The Drover, winner of the Hurdle Race at the Hawke’s Bay Racing Club’s Meeting on March 17, was used as a hack by Mr Death, of Waibotara, and taken to Napier by his son and swapped away for another horse.” He is a eon of Patriarch. At the last monthly meeting of the Australian Jockey Club Committee a license to train at Randwick was granted to Mr Joe Kean (brother of Jas. Kean, of Kohimarama), who ha 3 erected stables near Arbhur-street, Surrey Hills. A Sydney scribe says the present generation of racing people have almost forgotten, or did not know, Joe Kean as a horseman. The “New Zealand Referee,” in a leading article last week, eulogises the Auckland Racing Club for the way they manage their Distressed Jockeys’ Fund. Among other things, the writer says : “There are several racing clubs in New Zealand whose Distressed Jockeys’ Fund is more or less of a sham and a delusion, and who, when applications for relief are made to them, grimly button up their pockets, and profess that the application does not come within the scope of the objects of the Distressed Jockeys’ Fund.” THE DAUGHTERS OF BLAIR ATHOL. A recognised authority on breeding, the “Special Commissioner,” contributes an article to the columns of the “Sporting Life ”on bhe daughters of Blair Athol. The writer in question does nob form a very favourable impression of the daughters of the pale-faced chestnut who won the Derby 25 years ago, for this is how he sums them up : —“ After working it all through, no other conclusion can be come to than that Blair Athol’s daughters have been as marked failures as his sons, and it is a remarkable caseof a very great horse, underall the ad vantages of the bestpatronage, proving himself to be of very little value as the head of a line. There may be a revival of the family through the productions of his younger daughters, but at present the outlook does not look very favourable. ” Referring to the male line the same authority remarks “ A stallion list of the present day is singularly barren of Blair Athol sires, as only three can be found, namely, Altvre, Glendale and Child of the Mist, and one undoubted grandson on the male line, viz., Bread Knife, thoneh in my own opinion St. Gatien is truly enough such a grandson, but yet under a question in all official records. There is sufficient material in the above four horses I have named to revive the line into fashion again, but it looks very different to what Stockwell’s pretensions appeared to be 25 years after he had won the St. Leger, and what it does now, nearly 40 years after, as, putting Blair Athol on one side, there is Bend Or and other sons of Doncaster, together with all the sons of Lowlander, Uncas, Bertram,Lord Lyon, Lord Ronald and St. Albans, to secure a male line. In fact, at the present moment five grandsons, or great grandsons, of Stockwell are covering at fees above 100 guineas each, name’y, Bend Or, Minting, Springfield, Melton and Chitabob. Thus the line is not likely to grow less. And the same sort of argument can be used forNewminster through about three branches ; but Blair Athol, who should have been a greater horse than either, has nothing but a. few cheap sires to keep him green in the direct male line.”

Black though be the colours in which the “ Special Commissioner” has portrayed the lineal male arid female descendants of Stockwell’s famous son, the Australian turf is fortunately able to put forward a much more happy family picture, especially in the male line, for was not the defunct St. Albans a son of Blair Athol, a horse whose stud credentials justly entitle him to disDute the pride of place with Musket and Chester. The mighty Malua, perhaps the best horse over all distances the Australian turf has ever known, has alone set up an everlasting monument in honour of his sire, and there are other innumerable grandsons of Blair Athol whose deeds will tend to keep his memory green for many a long day. What a reeord is Malua’s J His first notable step on to the platform of fame was when he carried off the Newnwket Handi.

cap with Bst 71b, then the Oakleigh Handicap with 9st 71b. His other leading performances are still fresh to memory, winning the Adelaide Cup with 9sb, the Melbourne and Australian Caps with 9sb 91b, then the Grand National Hurdle Race with list 71b, and finally the Geelong Gold Cup with 9st 41b. These performances of themselves would almost atone for any laches the male line of the Blair Athol family may be guilty of in England, but there .e numerous other famous grandsons we xn trot out. Byway of enumerating a few uf them I will, first of all, name Le Grand, one of the greatest racehorses of the age, who as a 3-year-old defeated admittedly the best field i hat has ever contested the Champion Stakes, when he downed Martini-Henry, Commotion, Off Colour, Navigator and Sting. Lycidas like, Le Grand was cut off in his prime, bat the household prestige has been admirably maintained by Blink Bonny, Sheet Anchor, Ringwood, Meteor, My Lord, Lothair, Tasman, Captain Webster, Abner, Coronet, Anchorite, Stockwell, Wheabear, Waterloo, Lady Betty, St. Odille, and last, but not least, the great Lochiel. lb will thus be seen that we have in existence a splendid supply of the Blair Athol male line, and any English studmasters enamoured of the blood and desirous of replenishing their apparently meagre stock would experience no difficulty in so doing were they disposed to open up negotiations with that end in view. Whatever prejudice may exist in England on the subject, it will readily be admitted that Blair Athol, through his sons, St. Albans, Epigram and Prince Charlie, has made for himself an indelible reputation on the Australian turf.

Our experience of the Blair Athol mares is also of a favourable nature, quite at variance with the character given them by the contributor to “Sporting Life,” viz. : “ That Blair Athol's daughters have been as marked failures as his sons.” The latest importations include Trafalgar, Moonstone, The Witch, Atholine, Athol, Lady Blair, Adieu and Banvie. To commence with Trafalgar, she is the dam of Dreadnought, the winner of this year’s Derby, St. Leger and Australian Cup; while Moonstone threw a couple of clinkers in Uralla and Carlyon. Athole has by no means made a bad beginning with Dunkeld, and as for Atholine, she is undeniably one of the gems of the “Stud Book.” Her first filly, Habena, carried off the Maribyrnong Plate, and six years later another of her daughters, Narina, carried oft the same rich prize. Geraldine, a full sister to the fore-named fillies, was also considerably above the average, as also were Atboline’s two sons, Blairgowrie and Huntingtower. It will thus be gathered that Blair Athol, as the “headof the line,” stands prominently forward in Australian turf history, and both his direct male and female descendants can lay claim to a large share of laurels distributed throughout the Australian “Stud Book.” “Melbourne Leader.”