did. One cannot follow the ups and downs of this unhappy sport of

Fortune without comparing the cheers that everywhere greeted him up to ’67 with the execrations with which he was assailed by the same rabble at Epsom the following year, and all because one of the most generous of golden calves had been tricked and swindled out of a colossal fortune in less than six years, and had met every obligation till plucked of his last feather.

Nor can one forget that the yelpings of his indignant judges (!) were mingled with the hacking cough that carried him to his grave five months later; yet nobody who saw him drive off the course would have imagined that the incident had affected him in the least. “I did not show it, did I?” he remarked to an intimate friend almost from his death-bed; “but it fairly broke my heart,” and so Henry Plantagenet Hastings was gathered to his fathers at the early age of twenty-six, and almost before the howls of the mob had ceased to ring in one’s ears.

Whilst on the fascinating but occult science of racing, the licence invariably accorded by an indulgent public will not it is hoped be here withheld if one jumps for a moment into the early seventies, an era, alas! as far removed from the present generation as the long-ago sixties. With railway facilities very different from those of to-day, it was the custom of “bloods” to make a week of it at Newmarket during the great meetings, and so it came to pass that a distinctly representative party took up their quarters at the residence of Mr. Postans, the courteous postmaster at Mill Hill, for the Two Thousand festival of ’72.

In those long-ago days class distinctions were religiously observed even in such trifles, and whilst the “second chop” resorted to the “White Hart” and other comfortable hostelries, the upper crust engaged houses at fabulous prices, to the advantage of owner and tenant.

The existence was as regular as it was exciting, the racing being followed by an excellent dinner and a stroll about nine to “The Rooms.” It was on the night before the big race that Forbes-Bentley—a lucky dog who owned a number of horses, and who had recently been left a fortune of £140,000 conditional on his adding a second barrel to his name—suggested to a sportsman at dinner that to avoid notice he should put some money on for him on Prince Charlie for the Two Thousand.

Beginning his racing career in a pure love of the sport, he eventually developed into a colossal punter, and discovered—it is feared too late—that the game is not a paying one. “Tommy,” he whispered to his next-door neighbour over their cigars, “I want a monkey on Prince Charlie; will you, like a good fellow, put it on for me with as little publicity as possible?”

Prince Charlie during the past twenty-four hours had been a little shaky in the betting, and from being firm at 2 to 1, 5 to 2 was at the moment being laid, and was to be had to any amount.

Entering the Rooms about midnight the air resounded with “5 to 2 against,” as, cautiously approaching the then leviathan of the Turf, Tommy inquired: “What price Prince Charlie?” “I’ll lay you 1000 to 400, Captain,” was the reply, and the bet being duly booked, he continued: “And now you can have 3 monkeys to 1 if you like.” “Put it down,” replied Tommy, who although exceeding his commission decided that what was good enough for Forbes-Bentley was good enough for him.

But barely had he left the bookie when up came T. V. Morgan, who had a score of horses with Joe Dawson, and inquired what he had been doing.

“Your horse is not going well in the betting, old man. I’ve just taken 3 monkeys to 1,” was the reply.

“My —, there must be something wrong!” he gasped. “I’ll go at once to Joe,” and without waiting a moment, he disappeared on his midnight mission.

Knocking up Joe Dawson, who had long retired to rest, the two proceeded to the stable, where it was found that the first favourite’s near fore leg was inflamed, with every indication of a swelling.

“By —, Morgan!” exclaimed the trainer, “this is d— serious; the horse has been got at, and may be again; we mustn’t stir from here for the remainder of the night.” And so the two kept vigil alternately till the saddling bell rang next afternoon. The head stable lad meanwhile and certain helpers were not admitted into the stable, and peremptorily discharged in the morning, and bonnie Prince Charlie won the Two Thousand fairly easily. But during the race there was a critical moment as the horses entered the Dip and his jockey was seen to move in the saddle. “A thousand to a carrot against Prince Charlie!” was now shouted by a hundred stentorian voices, but the shouts were happily short-lived, as the grand old roarer shot out of the crowd and won with apparent ease.

Joe Dawson and his colleague Morgan meanwhile were inundated with congratulations, and when Joe recounted the marvellous escape the good old horse had had, the congratulations were not unaccompanied by fervent hopes that the delinquents might yet be discovered and lynched.

On the authority of the late Joe Dawson it may be accepted that what occurred was of the simplest but most effective nature, and comes briefly to this: “That the fittest horse if gently tapped with a piece of wood on the back sinew will become dead lame, and leave no trace of the nobbling.”

But what led to the discovery appears more marvellous. If Forbes-Bentley had not commissioned Tommy to get his money on, and if Morgan had not casually asked what he was doing, the fact of Prince Charlie’s unpopularity might never have been brought home to the former; Joe Dawson might have continued in his undisturbed slumber, and Prince Charlie at daylight would have been found to be hopelessly lame.

It was the year in which Aventuriere ran for the Oaks that George Payne told me that he thought she had a chance of winning, and a hint of the kind meaning a lot from such a man as Mr. Payne, I decided to invest £15 in the hopes of landing £500. Meeting my friend after the race, I expressed my fear that the mare had not fulfilled his expectations. “Wait till you’ve seen her over a long distance,” was the encouraging reply. “Don’t repeat what I’m saying, but when the weights are out for the Cesarewitch get your money back if she carries anything less than 7st.”

Laying this monition to heart, I decided to trust her for a big stake, but waiting, alas! to see how Alec Taylor’s lot would be quoted before acting on the hint, I proceeded to Newmarket with a sporting team.

“Come and dine with me to-night,” suggested Fred Gretton, “if you don’t mind meeting Swindells; you know what he is, but he’s d— amusing.”

Swindells was the owner of the first favourite, The Truth gelding, a patched-up old crock that had been pulled at every small meeting for months, and rewarded his enterprising owner by being given a nice light weight for the Cesarewitch.

“I hope you’re both on my ’orse for to-morrow,” inquired the genial Swindells. And I explained I had determined to back Aventuriere.

“What’s she got on?” asked Swindells. “What, 6st. 12lb.? D— me if any — three-year-old has a chance against my ’orse.”

It was then that I faltered, and, impressed with the speaker’s cuteness, decided to go against my original intention, and backing The Truth gelding, had the mortification next day of seeing Aventuriere win by a neck with little Glover up.

“Well, got home, I hope?” inquired Mr. Payne after the race, and when I told the truth, he added: “Never ask me for a tip again.”

It was thus that I lost the biggest chance of my life.

But it was before the above blow had descended that Mr. Swindells was at his best, and during the dinner that we have referred to told story after story which, however creditable to his resourceful genius, would by many be considered “fishy.”

“Ah, the Chester Cup was the race for getting money on in those days,” remarked the genial Swindells. “I once ’ad a crock called Lymington; ah, a rare useful one, too. At the October Meeting I put ’im in for an over-night race, the stable lad up, with orders to pull him up sharp soon after the start, jump off and wait. The ’orse was dead lame, of course, and for why? The lad ’ad slipped a bit of ’ard stuff into his frog.

“‘Bad case; breakdown,’ everyone said, so we took ’im back to the stables in a van. First the local vet. saw him, and then a big pot from London, and we humbugged ’em both. Not long after I entered ’im for the Chester Cup, but told everybody my d— fool of a clerk had made a bloomer of it, as the ’orse could never be trained, and so when the weights came out he was chucked in at nix. My eyes! what a cop! and, my Gawd, didn’t he win! Oh, no; only as far as from ’ere to nowhere!”

At Doncaster, too, the hospitalities were even of a more lavish style, and all the principal owners gave dinner parties nightly to their various friends.

The name of Sir Robert Peel recalls many episodes in the career of that most blustering baronet.

Beginning as an attaché at Berne, the first performance that brought him into prominence was an outburst of temper at a local Kursaal, when, seizing the rake, he belaboured an innocent croupier as the cause of his run of bad luck.

The Foreign Office, deeming change of air desirable, we next hear of him following the noble sport of racing, when I had the distinction of coming within the sphere of his amiable influence. It was in ’69 that I found myself on one occasion travelling to Newmarket in the same compartment as Lord Rosslyn and Sir Robert Peel; in the same train was Lord Rosebery, making his début as an owner of horses, and still unknown to fame as the most brilliant of orators and one of the best Foreign Secretaries England has ever had.

“What kind of fellow is young Rosebery?” inquired Lord Rosslyn; to which the most opinionated of men replied:

“He looks a fool, but I’m told he’s a bigger one than he looks.”

And this was the verdict of a man whose claims to celebrity were based on being the son of a brilliant father, on one who, in addition to a most successful racing career, is universally admired as a sound politician, a genial friend, and the most versatile of living public men.

It was about the same period that the fates again destined me to be within measurable distance of the over-bearing baronet, when young Webb, the jockey, had lost a race through no fault of riding. As he was fuming and abusing the unhappy youth, Mr. George Payne, who was present, protested against the unjust charge, adding that although he had lost considerably by the race, he in no way blamed Webb, who had carried out his instructions implicitly.

It was at this point one of the most amiable of men interfered, and laying his hand on George Payne’s arm, said: “My dear George, it will take three or four more crosses to get the cotton out of the Peel family.”

Of a commanding presence, and faultlessly attired in heavy satin cravat and large-brimmed hat, Sir Robert gave the impression of patrician down to the heels; it was only—as Sir Joseph Hawley suggested—when the crustation was tampered with that the plating gave indications of alloy. Peel was an inveterate gambler, and an admittedly fine whist player, and even so late as the early eighties might be seen daily at the Turf Club at the 2 and 10 table, and a pony on the rub. It was in this most select of establishments that a fracas occurred between this most irascible of baronets and a noble marquis (still living), when the pot called the kettle black. It ended in both members being suspended, then mutually apologising, and eventually being restored to the privileges of the fold.

A bad loser, he was deficient in one quality that makes a successful gambler, and so remained a failure, despite all the advantages that political interest gave him.

Of a different type was Sir Joseph Hawley; succeeding to a huge fortune before he was out of his teens, he went through the usual finishing school of those days, and served a few months in the 9th Lancers, after which he devoted his attention to yachting and visiting the various Mediterranean ports in the vain search of the pursuit for which nature had intended him.

It was at Corfu, then occupied by a small British garrison, that he had a unique experience. Entering upon one occasion the chief bakery of the island, he sought enlightenment on the process by which the bread was kneaded. Around a vast room, surrounded by a shelf, sat some half-dozen swarthy naked natives, whilst here and there lumps of dough were arranged in piles; on the floor stood two or three youths, whilst suspended from the ceiling dangled various ropes, which the respective squatters clutched firmly in their hands. At a given signal, away they flew, whilst the urchins deftly turned the dough, and then, with a flop, down came the naked natives, with eyes starting out of their heads, only again to fly into space, whilst their next resting-place was being duly adjusted.

No fear of indigestion where such perfect kneading was in force; indeed, the bread of Corfu bore an excellent reputation, and the island was considered one of the most popular of Foreign Stations.

It would be absurd to recount the numerous victories of the “cherry and black” colours, although the unique experience of Blue Gown being disqualified at Doncaster for carrying “over weight” in the Champagne Stakes may come as a surprise to many.

Scotland was represented on the Turf in the sixties by two shining lights of diametrically different types, the patrician Earl of Glasgow and the plebeian James Merry (of Glasgow), and whilst the former, during his fifty years, only once won a classic race—the Two Thousand—the latter swept the boards of everything over and over again.

Lord Glasgow was not a lovable man; bluff to a degree, and sensitive as lyddite, the brine that he imbibed in his youth never appears to have left him, for his lordship was in the Navy when keel hauling was in vogue, and the sixties found him as foul-mouthed, irritable, and cross-grained as any British tar ought to be.

Suffice that in those hard-drinking, hard-swearing days, no head was harder, no répertoire more complete than that of this belted Earl (why belted?), who, with all his faults, was a grand landmark of what a patrician of the old days was, as surrounded by his boon companions, General Peel, George Payne, Lord Derby, and Henry Greville, the magnums of claret flowed in the historical bay-window at White’s. But this was before membership was “invited” by advertisement.

James Merry, on the other hand, was a typical semi-educated Scot, game to the backbone, but not up to the standard then required in a gentleman. He came, indeed, before his time; had he lived to-day, a baronetcy, or certainly the Victorian Order, would have been his reward.

It has been the lot of few men to own such horses as Thormanby, Dundee, Scottish Chief, MacGregor, Sunshine, Doncaster, and Marie Stuart, and despite the fact that no suspicion ever rested on James Merry’s fair name, it is an open secret that when MacGregor was backed for more money than any Derby favourite before or since, the Ring told him, “If he wins we are broke”—and he did not win.

Devout Presbyterian though he was, he succumbed, alas, on one occasion, to French blandishments, and ran a horse on the Sawbath. Summoned by the “Elders” of Falkirk to explain the terrible lapse, he freely admitted his sin, and only obtained absolution by presenting the entire siller to the Kirk.

But no reference—however superficial—to the Turf in the sixties would be complete without one word of homage to the great Englishman who did so much for the honour of old England both in sport and politics. Not that his greatest admirer can place Lord Palmerston in the front rank either as a diplomatist or an owner of racehorses, though none can deny him the marvellous combination of attributes that endeared him to his countrymen, whether in office or opposition, as when crying “hands off” when his prerogative as Prime Minister was being tampered with; or when leaving a debate to come out and shake hands with his trainer; or when at Tattersall’s watching the fluctuations in the betting over his hot favourite, Mainstone, for the Derby; or when twitting his political opponent (Lord Derby), whom he had just replaced as Prime Minister; or, again, whilst watching Tom Spring or John Gully punching in the ring long before any of us were thought of. Ah, there was a man; an Englishman without guile, and of a type well nigh extinct!

Lord Palmerston never attained pre-eminence on the Turf, and when Mainstone—as was suspected—was tampered with before the big race, and when, on a later occasion, Baldwin broke down in his training, he decided to abandon the sport; what more noble than the letter he wrote to Lord Naas giving him his favourite to place at the stud? No auctioneering, no huckstering—but a free gift such as only a great Englishman would have conceived.

And who that frequented the Curragh meetings in the long-ago sixties has not admired the noble form of this same Lord Naas (assassinated in ’72 in the Andaman Islands), accompanied by those stalwart Irishmen, the late Marquises of Conyngham and Drogheda?

England must indeed “wake up”—to quote a phrase as old as the hills—if such records are to be maintained, and seek—perhaps in vain—for other giants such as these mighty dead, if we are to be what we were in sport and politics amongst the nations of the earth.

For like the ripples on a placid lake before some great convulsion of nature, a Cromwell is succeeded by a Charles, and the Palmerstons make way for less sturdy clay, and then the great upheaval comes, which ends in chaos, or the prosperity that is associated with “a great calm.”

Whether these momentous events will occur, simultaneously with the establishment of a Duma, and a great penny daily in Jerusalem, and the abandonment of historical English and Scottish seats for castles on the Rhine, it would require a modern Jeremiah to foretell, but the pendulum is oscillating ominously, with a throb that is not to be mistaken.

Lord Falmouth, whom no earwig ever ventured to associate with a fishy act, holds the proud distinction of never having backed his opinion in his life, if we except the threadbare tale that every biographer sets out as if it were not known to everybody, of how he once bet sixpence, and paid it in a coin surrounded by diamonds.

With this attribute universally known, it is perhaps not difficult to explain the immunity he obtained from innuendo when his horse Kingcraft won the Derby in the memorable year that the Ring “approached” James Merry, despite the fact that he only ran third to MacGregor in the Two Thousand.

That Lord Falmouth was a successful horse-owner may be accepted by the £300,000 he undoubtedly won in stakes during the twenty years of his career; that no one begrudged it him is shown by the unanimous regret of the racing public when he practically retired from the Turf, and that even so “close” a man as Fred Archer, the jockey, should have subscribed towards a presentation silver shield speaks volumes for his popularity.

Lord Falmouth, like his grand old naval ancestor, is now a matter of history, and nothing remains but the two guns outside the family town house in St. James’s Square to remind the passer-by of two great men, who in their respective spheres were _sans peur et sans reproche_.

To Fred Archer, as a phenomenon of a later period, who was latterly Lord Falmouth’s jockey, it is out of the sphere of these annals of the sixties to refer, but seeing him as I often have over his usual breakfast of hot castor-oil, black coffee, and a slice of toast, it seems incredible that he should have lived even to his thirtieth year.

Constantly “wasting” to try and attain 8st. 7lb. his mind and body soon became a wreck, and then the sad end came by his own hand with which we are all familiar.

Bob Hope-Johnstone and his brother David (“Wee Davy”) were two as fine specimens of the genus man as can well be conceived; but like Napoleon—who, according to experts, ought to have died at Waterloo—Bob outlived the glory of his youth, and became a morose, cantankerous wretch, who spent half his time at the hostelry now known as Challis’s, which in the sixties was the resort of every jockey—straight or crooked—that held a licence from the Jockey Club.

Another shining light about this period was Prince Soltykoff, whose wife was one of the handsomest women in England.

It was after her death that he came into prominence as an admirer of beautiful women in general, and of little Graham of the Opera Comique in particular, and—later on—of goodness knows how many more. Many a time have I seen him at Mutton’s at Brighton, loaded with paper bags full of every indigestible delight, which the imperious little woman beside him continued unmercifully to add to.

Lord Glasgow, who was distinguished in the sixties as possessing the longest string of useless yearlings, was, in addition to other peculiarities, the most hot-tempered explosive that epoch produced. Kind of heart in the bluffest of ways, and throwing money about with a lavish hand, I remember on one occasion finding myself on the railway station at Edinburgh as his plethoric lordship was purchasing his ticket. Tendering a £5 note, the clerk requested him to endorse it, which, having been done with a churlish air, his temper rose to fever pitch when the clerk, returning it, said, “I didn’t ask you where you were going; I want your name, man!” A volley of abuse, in which he was a past-master, then followed, and the abashed official realised that what he had mistaken for a grazier was the redoubtable Earl of Glasgow.

The sporting critic of the _Morning Post_, who wrote under the name of “Parvo,” once felt the weight of his indignation for what, after all, was a fair criticism of the great man’s stud, and when, in ’69, an obituary article appeared in the _Post_, the incident and the exact wish his lordship had given expression to were conveyed in flowery symbolism as a hope “that he might live to water his grave, but not with tears.”

The Earl of Aylesford in the sixties was the owner of Packington Hall, and a princely income, and it was whilst I was staying with George Graham (owner of the famous Yardley stud where the great Stirling “stood”) that a jovial party drove over from Packington. Luncheon as served in those days was an important item in the programme, and long before the Packington party began to think of returning more than one had succumbed to the rivers of champagne that flowed. Bob Villiers (a brother of the then Earl of Jersey) was one of the first to collapse, and as he disappeared under the table the kindly host’s anxiety was curbed by a shout from Joe Aylesford, “Never mind, George, he’s only tried himself a bit too high.”

A few years later Joe was one of the party, selected in company with Beetroot (as Lord Alfred Paget was affectionately called) and others, to accompany the Prince of Wales to India, and it was during his absence that the troubles that culminated in disaster overtook the popular Earl. “Don’t go to India, Joe, if you value your domestic happiness,” was the advice of an old friend, but go he did, and then began the intrigues of a titled libertine, which ended in strong drinks and the mortgaging of the ancestral acres.

Amid this genial phalanx no better host was to be found than old Fred Gretton, and it was apropos of the Cambridgeshire that the following incident occurred.

Seated round the festive board were some dozen sportsmen, young men from town and old men from the shires; dear old George Graham (the breeder of Stirling) and his brother; Duffer Bruce (father of the late Marquis of Aylesbury), deafer than usual, but shouting the house down; myself, Peter Wilkinson, and three or four worthies of the farmer class who had come in the wake of Fred Gretton.

“I should like you to win a large stake,” whispered to me a jolly old squire who had been my neighbour at dinner.

“Nothing would give me greater pleasure,” I replied; “the more so as this is positively the last meeting I am ever likely to be at before going to Gibraltar.”

“Eh, lad, and why so?” persisted my well-wisher. “I should like you to win a large stake,” and realising that it was now or never, I boldly replied: “Look here, Mr. Bowden, if you can put me on to a good thing I shall be eternally grateful.”

“I suppose you’ve never heard of Playfair?” inquired Mr. Bowden. “He’s Fred’s horse, and he’s certain to win the Cambridgeshire; he’s only got 6st. 3lb., the acceptances are just out, but, for God’s sake, don’t let Fred know. Now, lad, do as I tell you; I’ve taken a liking to you.”

It must be admitted I had never heard of Playfair—very few had—but acting up to the tenets I had learnt during my two years’ intimacy with the late Hastings, I boldly took 1,000 to 15 within the hour with the leviathan Steele.

“What are you backing?” inquired Mr. Gretton, who that moment came hurriedly up, and on being informed by the bookie, he turned to me and whispered into my ear, “There’s only one man could have told you, and that’s that d— drunken old blackguard Bowden; but not a word, mind you, you keep to that 1,000.” And so the kind old man toddled off. Shortly before the race, at the Bath Hotel, Piccadilly, where he always stayed in Town, he inquired of the two barmaids if they would like a sovereign each on his horse; and whilst the foolish virgin expressed a preference for the coin, the wise virgin elected to be “on,” and after the race received from the genial punter £35—a sum considerably in excess of the price.

Suffice to say, Playfair won the Cambridgeshire for Mr. Gretton in ’72, and it is no exaggeration to add that his taking to racing to the extent he then did suggested the idea—afterwards elaborated—of turning Bass and Co. into a limited liability company.