The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1893-10-11
High Prlced Horses Sold.

Speaking of costly horses, says
Clark's Horse Rerieao, the purchase Of
the English race horse, Ormonde, by
William o. B. McDonough, the Cali
fornia millionaire, for the princely
sum of $780, 900 calls to mind some
extravagant prices paid for horses in
the past. We do not mean the s1O5,-
600 paid for Axtell, nor the $125, 600
for MIR. Forbes great colt Arion, nor
the biz prices paid by that prince Of
good fellows, Robert Bonner, for his
various purchases. But we refer to
some historical purchases, prices paid
in the dim and distant past, a time
which many of our readers no doubt
had supposed was void of any extrava-
gance in that one weakness which
seems to have pervaded all epochs of
civilized time-a weakness for great
horsefesh.
The writer has been recently spend.
ing a half hour with handful of old
Latin books, and has had the curiosity
to see what the ancients thoug ht a good
horse was worth. The curtain Of an
tiquity first rolls up on Egypt, and
here we find it recorded in a letter, or
rather papyrus, left by one Of their
Kings of the eighteenth dynasty
telling of his conquest Of foreign ma
tion-Mesopotamia-and how he
brought lot Of very fine horses from
that country. Homer also tells us
how King Agamemnon offered Achil-
les twelve horses that would win for
him great riches by their racing.
In later years we find King Solomon,
the wisest of men, sending to Egypt
and paying as high as $4,000 to $4,000
for horses. His own stable was mag
nifcent. Alexander, according to Plu-
tarch, gave about $13, 900 for Buce-
phalus, the most noted Of all horses of
antiquity; but Pliny, the historian,
puts the price at nearer $4,000. And
here the spirit Of gaming crops out
again, for we are told that when Phi
lonicus, the Thessalian, offered the
horse to Philip, the father Of Alexan-
der, the King and his Court went out
to test the speed and docility of the
war horse. The horse was so vicious
and unmanageable that Philip prompt
| " discarded the idea Of purchasing,
but Alexander, standing near, who ap-
pears to have had more horse sense
than the rest, saw thatthe high-strung
| animal was frightened at his own
shadow, and remarked: "What a
horse they are losing for want of skill
and courage to manage him.
Alexander, who was one of nature, $
noblemen, conquered nations as he did
Bucephalus and after the conquest, by
his kindness and generosity, he won
them completely. We may learn from
him a lesson Of kindness to animals,
for when the horse was old he refused
to ride Linn on his long marches, riding
a commoner horse instead but when
he struck Darius, at Arbela, in one OF
the worlds decisive battles, he would
60 into the fight only on his old horse.
With all Of our boastful civilization
and fast records we are far behind the
Romans in the matter Of horse racing;
The Circus Maximus, which seated
| 2S5, 1000 people, was the greatest race
course the world has ever seen, and the
famous jockey, Diocles, whose likeness
engraved on the metal wheels Of q
child's play cart has been lately dug up
at Pompeii, is said to have earned over
million dollars in year. We may
very safely conclude, then that many y,
horses in those proAigate times sold
for more money than Ormonde or any
other horse of modern times. And we
might mention here that negro jockeys
are not an original American institu-
tion, for we learn that Cresceur, an
African jockey Of those days, was on one
of the greatest riders, and earned So,-
| 900 sesterces in one year. Verify, IN
the price Of horses as in other things,
"there is nothing new under the sun.