nd and trees. Say that the stud is a
useless luxury: but then, what about the daubs for which plutocrats pay
thousands of guineas? A picture costs, let us say, 2,000 guineas; it is
the slovenly work of a hurried master, and the guineas are paid for a
name; it is stuck away in a private gallery, and, if its owner looks at
it so often as once a week, it costs him L2 per peep--reckoning only the
interest on the money sunk. Is that useless luxury? The fact is that we
are living in a sort of guarded hothouse; our barbarian propensities
cannot have an easy outlet; and luxury of all sorts tends to lull our
barbarian energy. If we blame one man for indulging a costly hobby, we
must blame almost every man and woman who belongs to the grades above
the lower middle-class. A rich trader who spends L5,000 a year on
orchid-houses cannot very well afford to reprove a man who pays 50s. per
week for each of a dozen horses in training. Rich folk, whose wealth has
been fostered during the long security of England, will indulge in
superfluities, and no one can stop them. A country gentleman who
succeeds to a deer park cannot slaughter all the useless, pretty
creatures merely because they _are_ useless: he is bound by a thousand
traditions, and he cannot suddenly break away. A nobleman inherits a
colossal income, of which he cannot very well rid himself: he follows
the traditions of his family or his class, and employs part of his
profuse surplus riches in maintaining a racing stud; how can any one
find fault with him? Such a man as Lord Hartington would never dream of
betting except in a languid, off-hand way. He (and his like) are fond of
watching the superb rush of the glossy horses; they want the freedom,
the swift excitement of the breezy heath; our society encourages them to
amuse themselves, and they do so with a will. That is all. It may be
wrong for A and B and C to own superfluous wealth, but then the fact is
there--that they have got it, and the community agree that they may
expend the superfluity as they choose. The rich man's stud gives
wholesome employment to myriads of decent folks in various stations of
life--farmers, saddlers, blacksmiths, builders, corn dealers,
road-makers, hedgers, farriers, grooms, and half a score other sorts of
toilers derive their living from feeding, harnessing, and tending the
horses, and the withdrawal of such a sportsman as Mr. "Abington" from
Newmarket would inflict a terrible blow on hundreds of