At once Blanche Rose accepted the challenge, promising at the same time that he too would ride his own horse, and forthwith the stakes were handed to “an independent and neutral person” by each of the contestants. Arrangements having been made that the match should be run early in the morning of St Clement's Day, May 2nd, we read that, “a ce jour meisme que l'on courre l'awaine et le baicon au dit lieu St Clement,” the two riders, accompanied by many of their friends, went out through St Thiebault's gate, which had been opened before the usual time to suit their convenience, “and so passed into the field for the race.” There was much wagering on the result, and, as we should to-day express it, the Duke's mount was hot favourite. That Seigneur Nicolle was no novice in race riding is made manifest by the statement that he had taken the precaution to have his horse shod with extremely light shoes, also that “he came into the field like a groom, in his doublet and without shoes, and with no saddle but with a cloth tied round the horse's belly,” whereas the Duke wore comparatively heavy clothing and rode in a heavy saddle. The Duke's horse, however, jumped away with the lead and retained it during the first half of the race, “but when they were near St Laidre his horse lagged behind, so that the Duke urged him on with spurs until the blood streamed down on both sides; but it was in vain, Nicolle gained the race and the hundred and sixty crowns of the sum.” Several writers tell us that Nicolle Dex had trained his horse on white wine, but the truth would seem to be that he himself trained on white wine. We are informed, in addition, that the horse was not given any hay. “Le dit Seigneur Nicolle n'avoit point donne de foin a son chevaulx, ne n'avoit beu aultre chose que du vin blanc.” What the horses of four hundred years ago were chiefly fed on is uncertain. We know that usually they were given hay, but we find mention made repeatedly of “horse bread.” Probably this horse bread resembled the modern oil cake upon which cattle is fed, for we read that it tended to make the horses' coats “soft and glossy,” an attribute of oil cake of which horse dealers are well aware. It seems hardly necessary to mention in this connection that in Henry VIII.'s time, and indeed down to a much later period, the art of training horses, as we understand it to-day, was practically in its infancy. Also we are able to infer that it was quite a common practice to give a horse a drink of water just before running him in a race, and that what we to-day allude to as the art of judging pace in connection with race riding probably had never been even thought of.