Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1872-10-17
Wagers.
4 COLLECTION OF CURIOUS BETS.

/
/ When the Earl of March undertook
/ for a wager of a thousand gulneas to
/ nrovide a four wheeled carriage, drawn
by four horses, and driven by man, to
/ travel
/ NINETEEN MILES WITHIN AN HOUR,
/ he did not hesitate at spending seven
/ hundred pounds in the preliminary eX-
/ periments and was rewarded for his
| perseverance by an easy triumph. The
| Earl's carriage was sort OF skeleton
one, resembling in appearance a gun
| carriage, but constructed in the lglltest
possible manner The slender pole was
| iapped with fine wire; the drivers seat
was of leather straps covered with vel
| vet the breechings were of whalebone,
! the bars of thin wood strengthened with
| steel springs; the harness was Of thin
! leather covered with silk, and the brass
| boxes of the wheels had oil tins attached
I to them to drop oil slowly for one hour
| exactly. The whole affair could be cas-
! iIy carried by a man. The driver was
| only driver in name, for each horse
! carried jockey, and between them they
managed to do the nineteen miles in fiji
| ty-three minutes and twenty-seven sec
| Onds. Barnard Calvert in 1919, setting
/ out from st. Georges Church, South
wark, at three in the morning, rode to
! Dover, left his horse there, and crossed
| over to Calais in a small vessel then
returning the same way, he took horse
again at Dover, and reached st. Georges
! before eight in the evening. the journey
being accomplished in seventeen hours
! and ten minutes.
FAST WALKING.
In 1775, a lawyers clerk, named Pow
/ ell. walked from London to York, rested
one night there, and walked back again
all in the space of six days. In 1850, a
man over forty years old ran from
| Shoreditch to the eight mile stone be-
vond Edmonton in fifty minutes. In
| 1868, shepherd ran fifteen miles on
! Moulsey Hurst in one hour and twenty
eight minutes. and a militia man walked
from London to Bristol in nineteen
! hours and thirty-fOur minutes. In 1906.
! the bells of Newmarket rang in celebra-
! tiCn of Captain Barclay completing his
| task of walking thousand miles in a
| thousand hours. At the beginning of
| the present century. men like Squire
! Osbaldeston and Captain Ross were
/ ready to 90 anywhere, and do anything
/ at moments notice "A large party
! were assembled at Black Hall, in Kin
cardineshire, time, the end of July or
| beginning of August. We had all been
shooting snipes and fiapper ducks in a
! large mOrass on the estate called Lum-
/ phannon. We had been wading among
/ bulrushes up to our middles for seven or
| eight hours. and had had a capital din
/ ner. After the ladies had gone to the
/ drawing room, fell asleep; and about
| nine o'clock was awakened by the late
/ Sir Andrew Keith Hay, who said: Ross.
old fellow! I want you to jump up and
| 90 as my umpire with Lord Kennedy.
/ to Inverness. I have made a bet of
/ twenty-five hundred pounds 4 side that |
| get there before him! Nothing came
amiss to the men of that day. Ny an
swer was. All right, I'm ready: and
off we started, there and then. in morn
| ING costume, with
THIN SHOES AND SILK STOCKINGS
on our feet. We went straight across
the mountains. and it was a longish
walk I called to my servant to follow
with my walking shoes and worsted
stockings. and Lord Kennedy did the
same. They overlook us after we had
gone some seven or eight miles. Fancy
my disgust My idiot brought me, Ger
tainly worstcd stocking, but instead of
shoes a pair of tight Wellington boots
The sole of one boot vanished twenty
five miles from Inverness. and hadnow
to finish the walk barefooted. We walk
ed all night, next day. and the next
night-raining torrents all the way. We
crossed the Grampians, making a per-
fectly straight line, and got to Iverness
at one P. N. We never saw or heard of
Sir A. L. Hay Che went by the coach
road via Huutley and Elgin, thirty-six
miles further than we, but a good road,
who appeared at 10 a. NJ, much cast
down at finding he had been beaten. In
this extraordinary walking match, Lord
Kennedy and Captain Ross walked be-
tween ninety aud ninety-eight miles, and
Sir Andrew between a hundred and
twenty-six and a hundred and thirty-two
not bad work in bad weather, after a
firing days shooting and hearty dinner.
Lord Kennedy backed Captain Douglas
to beat Captain Ross across four miles
of country. The night before the race
it was mutually agreed that crossing,
jOstling, or
RIDING DOWN
were to be allowed. The first jump was
to be a five barred gate; when some
forty yards from it Ross saw his oppo-
nent's horse intended to refuse, and
holding his own well in hand, prepared
to seize the opportunity. As Rad
ical turned, Ross struck the spurs into
Clinkcr, sending Douglass horse heels
over head, and knocking Douglass him
self over the gate. The latter sooR re-
covered himself and re-mOunted, but by
that time Ross was so far ahead that the
race was virtually over. Il suppose"
says the victor, Sin these shOp-keeping
days, killing man in that way would
be brought in willful murder; not so in
1926; the verdict would have been iusti-
fable homicide Desperate as the act
was, Captain Ross was only acting ac-
cording to the conditions of the match
but no such plea could be raised on be-
half Of the perpetrators of
MURDER AT CHICAGO
in 1866. Two horses named Butler and
COrney were matched at trotting, the
Darkness set in before the horses started
for the decisive heat, which there was
every probability of Butler winning
Ihty Hdu uOb SOlIC lar vi tutlI journey
when a crash was heard, and Butler now
rushed by the judge driverless; by-and
bye came Corney, whose jockey quietly
observed as he pulled up at the winning
post. ''You'll find M'Keene on the track
below" He was found there with his
skull smashed in. A board had been
wrenched from the track fence, and
firmly planted near the course in such a
not nc NIL of
against the end of the plank, and the
match won and life lost. Wagers
have sometimes proved fatal to the I'M
conscious subjects of them.
PLUCKY WIFE.
About sixty years ago a French no
bleman wagered twenty thousand francs
that he would ride a horse. so vicious