RACING.

Reading about the Derby autumn meeting in mid-winter is not so

inappropriate as it might appear to be, for with sleet and snow falling

on the first day the elements were more wintry than autumnal. I have

seen this meeting celebrated with much more go than on the present

occasion. It is essentially a meeting for hunting folk, so far as the

county stand is concerned, and one seemed to miss far too many of the

familiar faces. The impression conveyed by the gathering was of the

lack-lustre order. Large fields of nurseries have long been a feature of

the meeting, but of course the winning or losing of them conveys little

merit or demerit. The fields for them have been larger; but I am not a

worshipper of large fields, not being a clerk of the course or a holder

of racecourse shares. From one point of view the field of twenty for the

Gold Cup was very satisfactory, for it meant that twenty horses were

thought to have a chance in a race of a mile and three-quarters. Fields

for distance races undoubtedly have been looking up of late years. Yet

few of our courses are less suitable for a race over such a distance as

that at Derby—a parallelogram with rounded corners. So soon as horses

have begun to stretch out along either of the longer sides—long only in

comparison with the extreme shortness of the other two—than they have to

steady for a corner. In such circumstances a mare like Hammerkop, who

was carrying 9st. 3lb., could stand but little chance. At Newmarket she

would have been well fancied. Yet there are people who grumble at those

fine, straightaway stretches of turf, because the horses start so far

away. These prefer courses of the circus order, for the sake of the

spectacle. Although the regulation straight mile has by no means met

with universal approbation, its introduction has more method than

madness about it. In the formation of a new course the laying out of a

straight mile must be associated with a good deal of luck, for, run in

one direction, it might prove popular and the reverse if run the other

way. At Gatwick there is a rise of some 6 ft. from start to finish of

the straight mile, and at Newbury, I understand, the rise is much more

than this. Experience has taught us that rising straight miles are not

so popular as falling ones, which may be argued to show a tendency to

weakness in horse-flesh, the qualities which take horses successfully up

the long hill at Sandown being not often met with. Here we have a hint

at a clashing of interests between such as like to have things made easy

for them and those which may be regarded as making for the higher

interests of the turf. This clashing of interests we shall always have

with us, so we may take it by way of our daily salt, with equanimity.

The Derby Gold Cup, as a trophy, was a perfectly delightful production,

it being a gold tankard in the 16th century style, and no one would

appreciate it more than the owner, whose sideboard it was destined to

adorn, for the race was won by Lord Rosebery’s Catscradle. Her starting

price of 20 to 1 was justified by her previous running and when she made

the first bend nearly last of all 40 to 1 would not have been taken.

However, it was her day, and she came through her field to win in

comfortable fashion by a couple of lengths from Airship. She ran

practically unbacked by her connections. The race for the King’s Cup of

two miles “did not fill.” Bachelor’s Button, who had acted as a

spoil-sport at Lincoln, by frightening away opposition for the Jockey

Club Plate, and walking over for the £300 given by the Jockey Club for

the express purpose of furthering sport at meetings where such

assistance would be welcome, had not been started for the Gold Cup. He

was in reserve for the King’s Plate, but the race “did not fill,” so the

meeting saved their £200 instead of increasing the winning account of

Bachelor’s Button by that amount.

As season follows season the Manchester meetings attract a diminishing

amount of attention. It is a question of reaping what you have sown.

Large sums of money were spent upon an unsuitable site, much of the

money in the erection of buildings more adapted to municipal purposes

than to racing. Except that the big turn is one of the finest in

England, the course has proved unsatisfactory, in consequence of the

rapidity with which the going goes wrong under wet. In this respect the

course is not much better than the old one, which it will quite resemble

when it has undergone a course of protection from frost by means of hay

for the same number of years. “Disappeared in the main drain, I assure

you,” explained the late Duchess of Montrose on the occasion of one of

her horses coming to grief in the evil going of the old course. People

of the Turf standing of the late Duchess do not find themselves at the

new course. The better classes of Manchester firmly decline to be

attracted by the races, despite the club stand, the contrast with

Liverpool being remarkable. The weather rarely fails to make the

November meeting a ghastly affair. In going back to Castle Irwell the

management deliberately went to the home of fog, and, in consequence,

most of the racing, as a spectacle, is a farce. We are all aware that

the period at which the November meeting is decided is too late for good

weather, but any attempt to move the fixture forward, supposing such a

desire existed, of which I have no knowledge, would scarcely meet with

success. If the Stewards of the Jockey Club regard the meeting as an

unimportant one they can claim to take this impression from evidence

supplied by the meeting itself, the average value of stakes not

entitling it to any standing. Eight of the twenty races provide the

minimum £100 allowed to the winner, for instance. There must be some

significance in the reduction of the Whitsuntide meeting, at which all

the money is made, from four days to three. This year’s November meeting

was treated to continuous wet, the going of each succeeding day being

worse than that preceding it. The November Handicap was run on the last

day, and the field of nineteen included some good handicap horses. As at

Derby, form was knocked into a cocked hat, the 25 to 1 Ferment gaining a

decisive victory. It is a pity that the racing season is each year

brought to a close in this uncomfortable manner, and if one cannot quite

go with those who recognise no racing previous to that taking place at

the Newmarket Craven meeting one can at least see some plausibility in

ending it with the Houghton. If mudlarking is to be done, one may as

well do it personally, to the tune of hound music.

Although racing ends for the year at Manchester, the curtain cannot be

said to fall until the Gimcrack Club dinner has been held. The function

to which custom has given such wholehearted recognition sits well on the

shoulders of the York Race Committee, which, as the Chairman at the

recent dinner very properly pointed out, gives back to the Turf

everything that is earned by the races. There are not many race-meetings

of which this can be said; and what a contrast to money-grabbing

Doncaster! Of course it is not wholly and solely custom that assigns to

the Gimcrack dinner the importance which attaches to it. We have a

trenchant way nowadays of kicking overboard any custom, however hoary,

which has outlived its utility. For the Gimcrack dinner there is much

need, for it is the only occasion of the year upon which Turf topics may

be publicly ventilated. As to the kind of topics touched upon and their

treatment, those depend upon the particular person who may be called

upon to ventilate. When we consider that the guest of the evening, to

whom free rein is given if he wants it, is the owner of the winner of

the Gimcrack Stakes, we realise how very uncertain must be the question

of oratory. It is possible to conceive an owner of a Gimcrack winner

taking but little stock in the higher interests of the Turf. Mr. Hall

Walker, whose filly, Colonia, won him the Gimcrack Stakes of 1905, is,

however, not a man of this sort. How it came about I do not know, but

some people expected Mr. Hall Walker to say “straight things” to the

Jockey Club; but nothing could have been more exemplary than his

references to that body. He was full of anxiety for the welfare of the

Turf as connected with the welfare of the horse, and his enthusiasm led

him to propound schemes some of us, I fear, will be inclined to regard

as Utopian. Taking as his text the statement that, “In all the leading

Continental States the production and development of the horse is made a

subject of governmental care and solicitude,” Mr. Hall Walker proposed

that the British Government should grant, if not funds, at least power

to the Jockey Club, who was to embody amongst its functions that of a

society for the encouragement of horse-breeding. In order to accomplish

the desired ends, the Jockey Club was to have the power to establish

race-meetings over all or any common land free from interference by

local councils and the freedom to acquire by purchase any existing

race-meeting. I do not pause to consider the plausibility of such a

project or the probability of the Jockey Club embarking upon it, for I

have used the word Utopian; Mr. Hall Walker next referred to the means

by which any shortage in funds was to be made good. They were to be

provided by the introduction of the _pari-mutuel_. He added—“The

advantages of the _pari-mutuel_ are clear and decided. In the first

place, it would provide large sums of money for the end we have in view,

and it would practically bring about the abolition of street betting.”

The writer’s views on the subject differ from those advanced by Mr. Hall

Walker, but space does not permit of a discussion of the question

raised.

Lord Downe in a speech, the tone of which charmed every one, maintained

that the only solution to the betting difficulty was to license

bookmakers and making betting debts recoverable. Of course his lordship

does not propose that the Jockey Club should take the initiative,

remembering, as he does, that when the anti-gamblers were last at work,

betting at Newmarket was disavowed. The Club could not well ask to have

that legalised which they claim does not exist. That the licensing of

bookmakers is a desirable thing all sensible men will gladly admit.

Racing would be all the better for it, but unless the trend of thought

takes an entirely new channel, I cannot see any form of Government

legalising gambling in the shape of wagering on horse-races.

Viscount Helmsley, who added to the nice things said by Lord Downe about

the Press, who came in for a rough handling at last year’s dinner,

suggested the institution of races for ponies up to 14.2, for the

encouragement of the breed. Racehorses in the past have not always been

the 16 hands animals that are now so common. Two hundred years ago

Mixbury, by Curwen’s Bay Barb, standing only 13.2, was the most famous

galloway of his day. Pony and galloway racing is no new thing in the

present generation, but it has not taken kindly to the sport. An

experiment was made at Plumpton on Whit Monday, 1903, which resulted in

complete failure, and it is not quite clear what racing under Jockey

Club rules could do. A race here and there would not effect much, and it

is an open question whether enough thoroughbreds of 14.2 and under exist

to fill many races. There are at least a few clerks of the course who

are enterprising enough to welcome any novelty, and if fields could be

assured a first step would be taken. Without such assurance he would be

a bold man to take the step of opening such a race. It might be worth

the while of those interested in pony breeding to provide the stake in

the first instance, and see how the suggestion took with others.

Experience in India teaches us that good sport is to be had out of

ponies.