The Sun.
London, England, 1866-03-30 00:00:00

UST.

The Laws and Practice of Horse Racing.
BY THE HON. ADMIRAL ROUS.

This little book is most characteristic of the Charley
Napier of tho Turf. In the very first sensation of the pre-
face he hoists the British flag; and then, steering his trim
corvette (which has been overhauled from stem to stern)
out of port, he fires a broadside into every suspicious look-
ing craft, very often without stooping even tc hail them
and examine their papers.

Brevity is the soul of wit, and half a dozen short chap-
ters comprise "the whole duty of man" on the Turf, be he
breeder, owner, trainer, jockey, or official. Racing philo-
sophy in the abstract comes within the scope of the pre-
face. Gladiateur is declared judicially to be " the best horse
since the days of Bay Middleton," a position which the
fond admirers of Blair Athol and West Australian may be
disposed to query ; and the sporting press hear the well-
known music of the cannon in the very 4th page. The
first chapter, "On the State of the English Turf in 1865,''
just glances at the great turf sore of the day—viz., "the
docility of horse-owners" who stand in with dishonest les-
sees, and treats at some length of the black mail which is
levied by the managers of meetings small and large. The
former is unfortunately one of those charges which it is
impossible to bring home. A starter pleading for his (offi-
cial) life to the A dmiral may divulge his accomplices in
the desperate hope of pardon, but both parties to those un-
hallowed contracts which flourish most especially with the
budding and the fall of the loaf keep their mouths closed,
and it is only when a straightforward owner demands the
whole stake and nothing but the stake, and is met with a
whining request for " only fifty out of it, that's not much."
that light comes through a chink. It amounts to certainty,
unless the whole racing world is in a perfect hallucination
on the point, that there aro meetings where the stakes are
hardly ever drawn, or, if they are, the money is returned
by arrangement, and that handsome bonuses, given
with an eye to the future, are flying about
at others. Still, like that celebrated Prude who in-
fests a certain large Charity on election days, and holds
mysterious vote selling meetings with red hot partisans in
corners shortly before the poll closes, the actors stand on
their honour when such a thing is breathed, and press their
hands on the region of their heart like the horsey Peck-
sniffs that they are.
On the general question of "black mail," the Admiral
quotes " a gentleman of great experience connected with
the press," who undertakes to tell his Father confessor
(whose satisfaction on hearing it must have been at once
grim and edifying) that the press dare not mention the
subject, or they would not have the advertising of the pro-
grammes. It would be most " ill-dispoged" of us to say
that there is "no sich person as Mrs. Harris" on the sport-
ing press. We quite believe there is, and she is, moreover,
capable of taking and acting as she has done. If she will
bo the special organ of the Admiral's occasional manifesta-
tions, she must not wonder if some of her tender but gos-
sipping confessions aro blurted out to the world. She must,
however, speak strictly for herself. We disclaim all sym-
pathy with brothers or sisters of the Press who dare not
tackle an abuse for fear of a diminution of the Saturday till.
We have had nothing to do with bolstering up Barrys
and M'Callums, but have preferred giving them the small
end of our rifle first, and the butt end afterwards, before a
judge and jury, at Guildhall, which is more than Mrs.
Harris dare do for her life. If we do not take Admiral
Rous's view of drawbacks at country meetings, where
lessees run on the square, it is simply because we believe it
to bo a most exaggerated one and not in unison with that
of the racing world, which is quite competent to take care
of itself, and quite ready to give "a first warning," and
often no warning at all, if a lessee is too mindful of " num-
ber one." The extortions practised at race towns have
been exposed over and over again to no purpose, and as
Admiral Rous's presence and precepts at his model New-
market have not made the Suffolk cormorants one whit
better, we can hardly hope for much amendment elsewhere.
Lord Cardigan can measure both horse and man pretty well
at an ynurnber of paces, and his lordship believes that a certain '
Newmarket surgeon can give most lodging letters a stone.
If this is done in the green leaf, what shall be done in the
dry?
The fallacy which runs through all the Admiral's argu-
ments,or rather invectives, against lessees is that they alone
make a business of racing, and that owners of horses are
doing them such a favour by coming that they should
have their sport for nothing. If racers were kept purely
for pleasure there might be something in it. Owners may
be so minded, if they ever meet departed Whalebones and
Gohannas in the Elysian Fields, but not while they linger
on this side the Styx. There is no getting over the fact
that racing has gradually become as much a hard British
business as calico manufacturing, and that in Manchester
bets are as regularly passed as sales through the ledger.
Owners no more expect to have race meetings kept up
week after week, at which they may make their bets and
land their "pots," without being subject to some taxation,
than to enjoy their pool or pyramids and not pay for the
table, or to do business with Messrs. Weatherby and not
be charged for what sporting foreigners call "de bureau."
They know too well the enormous outlay and risk which
a lessee runs to grudge him some aid if they win, in the
shape of drawbacks, as well as selling plates and entrances.
He has often to make himself liable for some hundreds in
the shape of added money, besides every other expense of
the course, police, &c., and another meeting set for the
same days or very bad weather may leave him wholly in
the lurch. Racing men are as just-minded upon these
points as they aro generous when a case of distress is
brought to their notice; but if a lessee was found pressing
them too hard he is pretty certain to hear something not to
his advantage when he goes up to them with his red book
in an enclosure or when entry day comes round. If the
owners were asked where the greatest entrance exactions
are practised they would say, nem. con., "Newmarket !"
and point to the three sovereign entrances to £5O over-
night plates, and the transcendent liberality of the Jockey
Club in giving 200 sovs out of their funds to the Cesare-
witch, and at the same time " sacking" the 2 sovs entrance
on the whole of the nominations, of which there were 181
last year. What is this but receiving nearly double what
is given to be run for ? The same remarks would apply to
the Newmarket Two Year Old Plate. As to weighing
fees, 10s. is charged for every horse that runs at New-
market, and even if a horse receives forfeit and has not
necessarily to appear, the fee for the scales is still de-
manded. If Ascot is to be the mode], why does not New-
market take pattern by the Royal Meeting in these matters?
Again, a Corporation is said to be like a cherubim in one
respect, that it has nothing tangible to kick, but the Ad-
miral always contrives to give the Doncaster ono (which
is now good for 3,000 guineas per annum in public money)
a flying shot when he can. We doubt the justice of his
remarks. The Corporation have always placed themselves
in the hands of the Jockey Club, and, with the exception
of a coronation knight and one or two other mild members
who used to " whobble a bit" over the annual vote, they
are all fond of the sport, and anxious in every way to meet
the racing world's wishes. Still, as trustees for the town,
it is with them a matter of business, and having invested
from £30,000 to £lO,OOO of corporation funds, they are
bound, if possible, to show a percentage for the money,
more especially as nearly a third of the burgesses reap no-
thing from the races but discomfort and heightened prices.
The expenses of the meeting are very great, and they
have, moreover, never made within a " monkey" of the
highest sum which the Admiral states. All their draw-
backs, &c., were freely handed over to the Race Fund a
few years since at the Jockey Club's suggestion, and last
year they gave £2,250 in addition to the Queen's Plate.
The Admiral is the only turfito who taunts them with
acting illiberally, and the taunt comes with no good grace,
as their list is regularly overhauled at Old Burlington-
street before it appears in the Calendar. His virtuous in-
dignation against them is also considerably discounted by
the complete silence which ho maintains about Goodwood.
He can hold up the Doncaster Corporation to odium for
nevercontributing sixpence to the Park Hill, but he has
not a word to say about the Gratwicke, the Ham, the
Findon, or the Nassau. He can sneer "at still the old
song, £2OO to the Great Yorkshire Stakes, the winner to
pay back 50 sovs," but ho is dumb about the Goodwood
Stakes, with not one penny added, end £l5 subtracted.
"Glorious Goodwood," and its support of the turf, is a
theme which he can hardly have missed by mistake. Those
who see the enormous throng on the Grand Stand, or have
to attend on the booth letting-day, can pretty well guess
that there is not a better farm than the racecourse on the
Goodwood estate, and yet last year, exclusive of the Queen's
Plate, and the Railways' hundred, only £1,050 was added
to thirty-four races. Doncaster gives back £1,050 of its
deductions assd selling gains to be run for, and Goodwood
deducts nothing from the stakes but a "pony" for the
starter, and takes the Richmond Plato entrances. Where
the entrances for two other plates go to is not stated. As
a regular attendant, and member of the house party, the
Admiral knows perfectly well that the advance in the re-
ceipts at Doncaster, on which he dwells so sneeringly, ap-
plies to Goodwood with equal force, and hence there is a
great lack of fairness in running down one meeting, and
running dumb upon the other.

Apart from such lopsided views, the little book is capital
reading. We can adduce no finer specimen of its style
than the passage on the woes of racing men, who are " im-
posed upon by racing committees, pillaged by lessees,
cheated by the publicans, liable to be poisoned by the sin-
ners, and anathematised by the saints." St. Simeon Sty-
lites on his polehad a comfortable time of it in comparison.
Their category of woes is wound up by a horse coughing
or lamed by running over "an atrocious course," or a lad
ruined by getting into a public house. Horses will catch
coughs at home as well as abroad, trainers must look after
their own lads, and if there ever was an "atrocious course,"
it was the latter part of the Cambridgeshire course in 1865,
when, owing to the neglect of the authorities, it was a 71b
pull for any horse that could get the shepherds' track amid
the wilderness of long grass. In the chapter "On the
State of the Law of Racing," Mr. Naylor's proposition
(which was, after all, only a bad imitation of a plan pro-
posed seventeen years since, to supersede penalties in a
weight-for-age cup race) is inferentially written down as
nonsense.; and we also learn that, as the law stands, a two
year old can run for a three year old, &c., plate, if the
owner is an innocent-minded man with a clinker, and
chooses to sink the year.
The rules of racing make up a capital chapter, and no
portion of it is more valuable than that which settles the
time within which certain complaints must be lodged