CORRESPONDENCE. KILL-SPORTS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIV, Issue 200, 21 February 1912, Page 4

CORRESPONDENCE.

KILL-SPORTS.

Tq the Editor. Sir, —Evidence of the narrowness of the mind of the kill-sport was spread all over the very prolix effusion of Mr. James Fortune on the subject of "Wednesday half-holiday for the races," published in the News to-day. Because J.F. i doesn't find amusement at races seems a poor excuse for rushing into print, and, after all, it is very doubtful if any of tire public care very much what J.F. thinks of the matter. If your correspondent had spent a couple of shillings and attended the races on Wednesday he would have had his eyes opened to th« fact that a big majority of the employers (as well as employees) of New Plymouth w-ere there, and they appeared to. be enjoying themselves too. That probably explains the: reason of the twelve o'clock closing on that day. The par. quoted re "influx of undesirables at race-time" is the stereotyped thing which helps to fill the "serious" pages of "very respectable newspapers," and the polieeman who reckoned that New Plymouth was "full of thieves" last week was apparently neglecting his duty, as he did not trouble himself to arrest any of them. Your correspondent has this assertion on his own: "Horse-racing and its accompaniments are the specific creation of undesirable characters." Really, he ought to knock about a bit and learn something. Such utterly narr6w-minded rubbish must disgust sportsmen who are ,-using every chance to make their amusement clean and above board. The leading men of the Dominion patronise horseracing, aad many of them ar# prominent members or our racing clubs. Everything possible has been done in recent years to keep the sport clean, and the proportion of undesirables to honest people attending races is infinitesimal. J.F. should not base hie knowledge of sporting folk' on Nat Gould's latest. Nat is a taleI teller And apt to stretch things.—l am, j ete., E. V. WILSON. I February 19.