Queens of the Turf.
Of course, there have been infinitely fewer great mares on the turf than
there have been famous and great horses. And this is peculiarly
noticeable in Australia, for what reason I am unable to say. Thus, since
the St. Leger was first instituted in this country until to-day, a mare
has only won the race six times. In England, on the other hand, during
the same span, a mare has been hailed the winner on fourteen occasions.
Perhaps it is for this reason that, when a mare does stamp herself as
the best of the year, and perhaps of her generation, she catches the
affection of the public even more firmly than does some great horse hero
of the course. It may be, too, that there is more sympathy felt by
everyone for the weaker vessel, and that naturally, for the crowd, who
are composed more of men than of women, it is easier to love anything
female as opposed to male. Whatever may be the cause, there it is,
anyhow. If you let your mind run back during the last sixty years or so
to the racing in the Old Country, the love manifested by the mob for
Regalia, Achievement, Caller Ou, Formosa, Hannah, Apology, La Fleche,
Sceptre and Pretty Polly was far more firm and enthusiastic than for all
the Ormondes, Isonomys, Donovans, Robert the Devils and Persimmons, no
matter what their achievements have been. And when it has come to a
contest between a colt and a filly in a classic race, the hearts of the
people have always seemed to go out to the mare. One can never forget
that year, perhaps the most sensational in the history of the turf, when
Hermit won the Derby. Whilst this great colt was making romance and
story, there was a beautiful mare, Achievement, who was gripping the
hearts of everyone interested in the sport of horse racing. She had not
had a career of uninterrupted success. And this fact, in a mare, in no
way alienates the affection of the people. On the contrary, sympathy
flows out to the defeated filly. During the autumn, in the Doncaster St.
Leger, she and the Derby winner were destined to meet. I cannot recall a
year in which such universal interest was taken in a race. My own
household were on tip-toe, and we awaited the result with bated breaths.
We were all for “the mare.” There was no rapid dissemination of news in
those days such as we “suffer under” to-day. Indeed, we were lucky, or
thought ourselves lucky, if we happened to hear a result before the
delivery of the morning papers at about ten o’clock next day. We were
all at tea on the evening of the great event. It was one of those quiet,
warm, brooding days of early autumn, when sounds travel to a great
distance. Suddenly we heard the crunching of feet far off, marching up
the carriage drive and, we all—“just a wheen callants,” you know—cocked
our ears. Was it the news? The footsteps halted at the open front door,
and the voice of a neighbour called out loudly, “The mare won by three
lengths.” And then, what a cheer burst from us! I should like to hear
the same again, in some modern household to-day. But this is but “an old
song that sung itself to me, sweet in a boy’s day dream,” and we will
pass to a consideration of the few Queens of the Turf in Australia since
the beginning of things. We need not revert to the Bessy Bedlams of the
early ’forties of the last century, nor the Alice Hawthorns of before
the flood. Worthy mares, no doubt, and reverenced by their worshippers,
but probably slow gallopers compared to the fliers of to-day.
Only six mares have won the Championship, and one of these took the race
twice. This was Ladybird, who was a New Zealander, and who was
victorious when that race was contested over in the Dominion. She was
successful in 1863, as a five-year-old, and in 1865. She was not a
“Queen.” Not another mare left her name on the champion roll until
Quiver, in 1896, when that fine four-year-old dead heated with Wallace.
Quiver was a very lengthy bay mare by Trenton from Tremulous, by
Maribyrnong out of Agitation (imp.) by Orest. As a two-year-old she did
not greatly distinguish herself, winning, out of three attempts, a
Nursery at Flemington. At three years she also earned but one bracket,
but, starting a hot odds-on favourite for the Oaks, she turned round
when the barrier flew up, and took no part in the race. That was the
first year of the starting gate, and the Derby, won by The Harvester,
was the earliest classic race in which the invention was made use of.
Horses were unused to the ropes in those days, and I can see now the
look of rather sulky surprise upon the mare’s countenance at what she,
no doubt, took for an abominable thing, dangled in the air beside her
nose. The field, without her, went off at a slow canter, and had Moore,
the jockey, set Quiver going, and followed the others, he would have had
no difficulty in catching them in the first half-mile, and it is certain
that Quiver would have won. As it was, the whole thing was a novelty,
and Moore seemed to lose his head, and to fall into a dream. But there
was a great outcry, and the “flatites” reckoned that they had been taken
down. Of course, there was nothing in it.
It was as a four-year-old, however, that Quiver earned her title. She
commenced with the Spring Stakes at Randwick, and she followed this up
with the Randwick Plate over those three long, tiring miles, beating
Portsea, amongst others. Tattersall’s Club Cup, two miles, with nine
stone two up, came next, and then the Essendon Stakes at Flemington,
when she put down Hova, Havoc, Preston and Auraria. And the crown was
finally put upon her head when the famous dead heat took place for the
Championship with Wallace. The mare was sold and went to India, shortly
afterwards, and there she gained further laurels.
I am not just absolutely clear in my mind that Quiver ought to be
included in the list of great Queens, but she was the first actually to
win an open Championship, for Ladybird only met New Zealanders and does
not count, and the finish with Wallace proclaimed the Trenton mare to be
a stayer, and a game one to boot. This was a period in our story when
good mares flourished. For Lady Trenton, the winner of the Sydney Cup,
was a contemporary of Quiver, although she cannot be included amongst
the Queens. She was a graceful, beautiful mover, a thorough Trenton, but
a handicap mare only. Her pedigree is interesting, in that her dam was
the famous Black Swan, by Yattendon from Maid of the Lake, “whose
pedigree,” says the Stud Book, “cannot be ascertained.” As Lady Trenton
was foaled as lately as 1889, it is a little curious that her grand
dam’s pedigree should be wrapped in mystery.
Sir Rupert Clarke’s La Carabine was the Champion winner in 1901 and
1902. She is pronounced unhesitatingly “a Queen.” Her first season did
not appear to hold out much hope of mighty deeds in the future; at
least, to those who were not acquainted with her domestic history. She
was a chestnut, foaled in 1894, by Carbine out of imported Oratava, by
Barcaldine, from Tullia, by Petrarch, her dam Chevisaunce, by Stockwell
out of Paradigm, by Paragone from Ellen Horne, the maternal ancestress
of Bend Or. Her breeder was Mr. O’Shanassy, but it was in the nomination
of Mr. Herbert Power that she was launched upon her career as a
two-year-old. She was an exceedingly mean-looking creature during her
first season.
Being much enamoured of her pedigree, I undertook the long journey to
Melbourne from the Murray in order that I might see her perform. I was
standing in the saddling enclosure looking out for the filly, when there
passed me a mean, ragged-looking, little thing, with a mournful cast of
countenance, and she knuckled over on both her hind fetlocks at each
step. “What on earth is that miserable little brute?” I inquired from a
knowledgeable friend at my side. “Oh! that’s a two-year-old in Jimmy
Wilson’s stable. La Carabine they call her.” This was a great shock, and
her running that season did not bewray the great possibilities that lay
beneath her rather washy chestnut hide. She was successful in a Nursery
at Randwick in the autumn, carrying seven stone seven, but beating
nothing of any great account, and she was absolutely unsuccessful as a
three-year-old. At four years she managed to dead heat at Flemington
with Dreamland, who, however, beat her in the run off, at a mile and a
half. But for this faint silver lining to her cloud, everything was
still in darkness. But I knew that she could beat Key, one of the
greyhounds of the turf, at anything beyond half a mile, and that she
could stay. Therefore, Hope was not yet altogether dead.
Ere the next season had dawned, however, La Carabine had passed into the
hands of Mr. W. R. Wilson, of St. Albans, whose manager, Mr. Leslie
McDonald, was certainly second to none as a trainer and stud master, if,
indeed, he was not facile princeps of all his contemporaries, or of all
those who had gone before him. And it may be that he will retain his
invincibility in his own line for all time. The only man whom I can ever
think of as being his “marrow” is Mr. J. E. Brewer. Under Mr. McDonald’s
fostering care the little mare won the Stand Handicap at the Flemington
October Meeting, and, after an interval of non-success, she was returned
as winner of the Australian Cup, run over two miles and a quarter. She
had now discovered her metier, for in Sydney, during April, the Cup fell
to her at two miles, she carrying eight stone two. Two days after she
beat Merriwee, weight-for-age, at three miles in the A.J.C. Plate, and
travelling on to Adelaide, she smashed the opposition in the Alderman
Cup, a mile and three-quarters, carrying the substantial impost of nine
seven. Now a six-year-old, and in the ownership of Sir Rupert Clarke,
after failing in the Melbourne Cup with nine seven, she gained a bracket
in the V.R.C. Handicap, carrying the same weight as in the Cup, and in
the autumn, the Essendon Stakes, and the Champion Stakes fell to her. In
Sydney the Cumberland Stakes (2 miles), and the A.J.C. Plate (3 miles)
were hers, and she completed her triumphs with a couple of victories in
Adelaide, the last of which was the S.A.J.C. Handicap, carrying ten
stone six. She ran but four times as a seven-year-old, and her one
achievement was once more winning the Championship, on this occasion
beating another reigning Queen, the peerless Wakeful. She was retired to
the stud in the following spring. It is seldom indeed that one sees a
great race mare vindicate herself in the paddock as well as upon the
racecourse, and La Carabine has been no exception to the rule. It is
true that her mates were chosen somewhat unfortunately, but it is
doubtful whether a mare who was what may be termed “trained to rags”
could ever have produced anything approaching herself in racing merit.
Her quality may yet be kept alive by one of her daughters, for her
pedigree is unsurpassable. And now we have arrived at the undoubted,
undisputed Queen of the Turf. You can call her the Empress of mares, a
worthy consort to occupy the throne alongside of Carbine himself. This
is Wakeful.
A bay filly, she was dropped in 1896 at St. Albans, and her breeder was
Mr. W. R. Wilson, whose racing career was then at its zenith. She was by
Trenton, the sire of Quiver, from Insomnia, by Robinson Crusoe, her dam
Nightmare, by Panic from Evening Star (imp.), the dam also of that fine
stayer Commotion. The nomenclature, you will observe, is distinctly
good, being suggestive of at least one of the parents all through, and
yet each name is simple, and there is no straining after effect.
As a two-year-old, Wakeful, who was a great thriver, and who laid on
condition very rapidly, was given a “rough up” across the common at St.
Albans, with several others of the same age as herself. Revenue, a
subsequent winner of the Melbourne Cup, was one of them, but the little
mare ran right away from them all. It was noticeable, and was the cause
of some mirth in the stable, that Wakeful’s rider on that occasion had
never been guilty before of winning a race either in public or in
private, and I believe he has never since equalled his performance of
that morning. This is manifest proof of the tremendous superiority of
the mare. Unfortunately, or fortunately, whichever way you like to take
it, Wakeful went lame after the gallop, somewhere in her quarters, and
it was deemed advisable to turn her out. A great difficulty, however
presented itself to her owner, in that she was such a contented,
good-constitutioned little thing that she would grow as fat as butter
upon the “smell of an oiled rag.” And meanwhile Mr. W. R. Wilson passed
out Westwards, and the stud being disposed of, the bay fell into the
possession of Mr. Leslie McDonald. Mr. McDonald made no attempt to get
her fit until she had passed her fourth birthday, and then she made her
debut in the Doona Trial Stakes at Caulfield, in September. Quite
unexpectedly, and with no money invested upon her, she ran second, and a
week or two later, she was unplaced in the Paddock Handicap at
Flemington. She was now most judiciously laid by until the Autumn, when,
in a field of twenty-one sprinters, and first favourite, at fours to
one, she finished four lengths ahead of anything in the Oakleigh Plate,
five furlongs and a half. At Flemington, three weeks subsequent to this
triumph, and carrying a ten-pound penalty, with only five to two betted
against her, she won the Newmarket from a field of eighteen—six
furlongs. From this time onwards her light burned with a steady
luminosity to the very end. In all, she took part in thirty-five races,
of which she actually won twenty-two, was second in nine, third in
three, and was unplaced on but two occasions. She was not placed, as we
have noticed, on her second appearance in public, in the Paddock
Handicap, and she was fifth in the Melbourne Cup, which was won by her
stable companion, Revenue, a good five-year-old gelding who was unsound,
and had been resuscitated, and carried but seven stone ten. Wakeful, a
five-year-old mare at the time, had eight stone ten. We need not
tabulate the wins of this truly marvellous mare, but here is a list of
her principal victories:—The Oakleigh Plate (5½ furs.), The Newmarket
Handicap (6 furs.), The Doncaster Handicap (1 mile), The Caulfield
Stakes (9 furs.), The Melbourne Stakes (1¼ miles), The St. George’s
Stakes (1 mile), The Essendon Stakes (1½ miles), The All-Aged Stakes (1
mile), The Autumn Stakes, Randwick (1½ miles), The Sydney Cup—carrying 9
st. 7 lbs.—(2 miles), The All-Aged Stakes (1 mile), The A.J.C. Plate (3
miles), The Spring Stakes, Randwick (1½ miles), The Craven Plate (1¼
miles), The Randwick Plate (2 miles), The Caulfield Stakes (9 furs.),
The Eclipse Stakes (1 mile 3 furs.), The Melbourne Stakes (1¼ miles),
The C. B. Fisher Plate (1½ miles), The St. Helier Stakes (1 mile), The
Essendon Stakes (1½ miles), The Champion (3 miles). The merit of any
victory depends, of course, not upon the race won, but on the quality of
the field in opposition, but you cannot find Wakeful wanting in this
respect. She beat, and habitually beat, all the best performers of her
day, and over their own distances, were they five furlongs and a half or
three miles, Hymettus, La Carabine—who, however, did once put her down
at three miles—Ibex, a mighty sprinter, Bonnie Chiel, Great Scot,
Brakpan, Abundance, Air Motor, The Victory, Footbolt, Sojourner, Lord
Cardigan, and all the crowd of handicap horses which she so often met at
enormous disadvantages in weight. And some of her defeats were scarcely
less full of merit than her wins. The Melbourne Cup is a good example of
this. Here Lord Cardigan, a really high-class three-year-old, and the
winner of the Sydney Cup with eight stone seven up in the following
autumn, only just got home from Wakeful. The three-year-old was
handicapped at six stone eight, the mare at ten stone. In the spring,
the colt’s weight-for-age would have been seven six, and the mare’s
weight-for-age and sex, nine one. She was actually giving him
twenty-five pounds more than her weight-for-age demanded, and she was
horribly ridden. All through her racing Wakeful suffered from this extra
handicap. Dunn, who usually rode her, was an indifferent horseman, but
Mr. McDonald preferred to trust to his unimpeachable honesty rather than
risk a more brilliant rider of whose integrity he was not absolutely
sure. Owners who have been in a like dilemma will sympathise with him.
Wakeful has not been a bright success at the stud, but she cannot be set
down as a failure altogether. She is the dam of Night Watch, a Melbourne
Cup winner—under a light impost, it is true, but you must be good to win
a Cup even with the minimum to carry. Another son, Baverstock, has sired
a good colt in David, and was a winner himself. She also threw a very
speedy horse in Blairgour, and this year, after missing for some three
or four seasons, she is due to foal as I write. As her years now number
twenty-six, it is unlikely that the produce will be a champion, but in a
good season, and with the care which will be lavished upon her and her
offspring, we can, at least hope.
Auraria, yet another Trenton mare, from Aura, by Richmond out of Instep,
by Lord Clifden from Sandal; Carlita, by Charlemagne II. from Couronne,
by Gipsy Grand—a New Zealand family—and Briseis, by Tim Whiffler out of
Musidora, winner of Derby, Oaks and Cup, might almost claim Queenship.
But none can come near Wakeful, and leaving her in undisturbed
possession of her throne, we will pass on to other things.