Part 24

Bookmakers are somewhat fond of working their commissions by the aid of persons who are known as "mugs," that is, persons who are presumably greenhorns; but the mugs have to be frequently changed, as they are soon spotted by the shrewd persons they try to "have." No kind of dirty work is too bad for the mercenaries of the turf, some of whom if the reward were sufficiently tempting would think nothing of "nobbling" the finest animal that ever ran. So that he can make money out of his stud, the mercenary owner will either run or pull. No man knows better than he does that "losing a race can be made a certainty," and that in many instances larger sums of money can be made by keeping a horse in the stable than by running it on the racecourse.

The knavery of the turf is so ramified that it is very difficult to tell either where it begins or ends. The telegraphic wires, as all owners of race-horses, bookmakers, and bettors are aware, are now extensively used for the communication of turf information. In towns where there is a great deal of betting, and in consequence several bookmakers, receiving from half-a-dozen to twenty messages every day, denoting changes in the betting or other occurrences during the progress of a race meeting, the telegraph clerks have been known to be so tampered with that information of an important kind meant only for one person has been made public. It is said that in some of our large towns the telegraph clerks have become demoralised, and that many of them bet on the sly, making use of information which has been obtained in their official capacity, and which they ought not to divulge. Ingenious plans have been devised by these persons in order to utilise messages forwarded from one turfite to another, or from a "tout" to his employer.

Say that a message is sent from an agent in London to a bookmaker in Liverpool, that Judas, an acceptor, is being heavily backed for the Cesarewitch, and that from being at 50 to 1 the previous night he is now at 100 to 6; the clerk will delay the message on some pretence or other for ten or twelve minutes, so that a confederate may have time to visit one or two bookmakers and obtain the longer odds, well knowing that the effect of the message will be to make the horse named a prime favourite in the local betting, so that if 50 to 1 can be obtained, a profit may be made by retailing the bet at a third of the odds. That represents one mode of procedure; another plan of petty swindling which has often been tried with success is for the clerks of one town to get from those of another town the result of some important race with great rapidity, and knowing the result, have matters so planned that a confederate will be able to back or lay against, as the case may be, the actual winner or some of the losing horses, with persons who think it too soon for the decision of the race to be known. The plan of working this kind of fraud is for a series of signals to be agreed upon in order to denote the winners and losers in a race. The confederate then proceeds to the Club or bookmakers' chamber, half an hour or twenty minutes before the time set for the race, and talks over the chances of the various horses, asking the state of the odds, etc. By-and-by his "pal" arrives with the news, but he says nothing, he simply sits down, wiping his forehead or blowing his nose as the case may be. This is the signal agreed upon, and the confederate in a most nonchalant manner says: "Very well, then, Bill, I'll just have a couple of sovs. on Busybee for a win, and a couple on Clarion for a show." The bookmaker, knowing his client has never quitted the room, suspects nothing, but takes the money and enters the bet. In ten minutes afterwards the official message comes in: "Busybee, first; Mussulman, second; Clarion, third." Such practices, it is said, are common enough.

VII.

Turf chicanery finds a wide field in the executing of what are called "stable commissions," a fact which can be best illustrated by narrating a typical case.

Mr. Salisbury Moor, having been informed by his trainer that his horse, Fatcheeks, had won a very excellent trial for an important handicap, resolved in consequence, in conjunction with Bill Gaiters, his trainer, to back his animal to win the odds to £300; the odds against the horse (there being three in the same stable, each thought to have a better chance than Fatcheeks) being at the time nominally 66 to 1. Gripely--"Bill Gripely," a well-known and smart "man of affairs" in racing matters--was duly instructed to invest the money at the best price at which it could be got on. While that commission was being executed, the business of the turf money market was not so open to the light of day as at present, so that a deal could be accomplished without much publicity. Bill Gripely, the commissioner alluded to, and his confederates, Warp and Woof, the bookmakers, were at once able to "tumble" to the situation, namely, that a great trial had been won, as Mr. Moor seldom put more than £20 on one of his horses. So thinking, the trio determined upon securing a very profitable slice of the pudding for themselves. Beginning business at once, the odds of 1,000 to 16 were obtained from four different sources, which bets were followed in due course by sundry others, till, in the end, a pretty considerable sum had been secured, probably not less than £30,000.

Of this handsome realisation of the commission it was not deemed necessary to return the owner more for his £300 than (in the circumstances) the paltry sum of £6,000. The owner of the horse, knowing full well that he had been victimised by Gripely and his coadjutors, resolved to punish the conspirators by striking his horse out of the race. He found, as he supposed, that his commissioners had determined to keep some £25,000 to dole out as the horse advanced in favouritism in the betting. The commission was begun on Monday, and on Thursday forenoon the result was intimated to Mr. Moor, who, as soon as he found out what had been done, struck his horse out of the race, much to the chagrin of the conspirators, who lost a few hundred pounds over the transaction.

Many similar stories might be related, but one serves to show this mode of chicanery as well as a dozen. As a matter of fact, turf frauds of many kinds, but especially those kinds which entail no penal consequences, are plentiful enough even at the present time. Not many months ago, a sporting writer in alluding to a popular northern handicap wrote in the columns of his journal: "It is quite clear the way to victory is being cleared for the favourite. I question if more than nine horses will be found at the post, or if more than two of these will be trying. Faugh! How the dead ones do stink, to be sure."

THE LADY ELIZABETH SCANDAL.

The sayings and doings of the turf world in connection with "the Lady Elizabeth Scandal" formed the subject of newspaper comment to such an extent at the time, that nearly every person in the habit of reading the public prints must have been somewhat familiar with the unhappy story, which may be briefly retold in these pages.

Lady Elizabeth belonged to the Marquis of Hastings, and was at one time first favourite for the Derby won by Bluegown, the property of Sir Joseph Hawley, in 1868, much to the astonishment of hundreds of persons who believed the Marquis's filly was "sure to win." Lady Elizabeth, during her two-year-old career, had never but once known defeat, as can be seen by referring to the turf chronicles of 1867, in which year the value of the stakes won by her reached a total of £9,665. The race which her ladyship failed to win during her two-year-old career was an important one, namely, the Middle Park Plate, which race fell to fortunate Sir Joseph by the aid of his horse, Greensleeve; Rosicrucian, an animal belonging to the same owner, running second. Had the Marquis won the Middle Park Plate, Lady Elizabeth's total winnings as a two-year-old would have amounted to a sum of over £14,000.

No sooner had the struggle for the Blue Ribbon of 1868 been decided--in which Lady Elizabeth was nearer last than first, although she started the undoubted favourite for the event with odds of 7 to 4 betted against her chance--than persons began to shake their heads and give utterance to the usual stereotyped remarks germane to such occasions, as, "I told you so," "A rank stiff one," "What a scandal," and so forth.

In plain language, it was assumed by a large section of the public that Lady Elizabeth had never been intended to win the Derby, but that, on the contrary, the mare had been for months an abject "market horse," and that thousands of pounds had been invested on the animal for the benefit of the Marquis and his aiders and abettors in the fraud; that all connected with Lady Elizabeth, from her owner down to the boy who every morning removed the litter from her stall, had made fortunes by means of the milking pail which had been in such constant requisition! Moreover it was currently stated among numerous reports circulated that Admiral Rous had asserted that the mare, just previous to the race, had been heavily drugged with laudanum; but the Admiral, in a letter to The Times newspaper under the date of June 15th, 1868, gave an emphatic contradiction to that report. In continuation, the Admiral went on to say: "My belief is that Lady Elizabeth had a rough spin with Athena in March, when the Days discovered she had lost her form--a very common occurrence with fillies severely trained at two years old; that when the discovery was made they reversed a commission to back her for the One Thousand Guineas at Newmarket; and they declared that Lord Hastings would not bring her out before the Derby, on which he stood to win a great stake. I am informed that when Lord Hastings went to Danebury to see her gallop they made excuses for her not to appear. If he had seen her move, the bubble would have burst. But the touts reported 'she was going like a bird.' Ten pounds will make any horse fly if the trainer wishes it to rise in the market. She has never been able to gallop the whole year. Lord Hastings has been shamefully deceived; and with respect to the scratching of The Earl, Lord Westmoreland came up to town early on Tuesday from Epsom to beseech Lord Hastings not to commit such an act. On his arrival in Grosvenor Square, he met Mr. Hill going to Weatherby's with the order in his pocket to scratch The Earl, and found Mr. Padwick closeted with Lord Hastings. In justice to the Marquis of Hastings, I state that he stood to win £35,000 by The Earl and did not hedge his stake money. Then you will ask, 'why did he scratch him?' What can the poor fly demand from the spider in whose web he is entangled?"

In consequence of such an outspoken expression of his sentiments by Admiral Rous, there ensued all round a very pretty quarrel. The Marquis of Hastings replied that the letter of the turf lawgiver was a tissue of misrepresentation from first to last, and that no single circumstance mentioned regarding his two horses was correctly stated. The late Mr. Henry Padwick, who was at once, rightly or wrongly, "spotted" by the public as "the spider" of the Admiral's letter, quickly joined in the war of words. "I was desired," he says, "by the Marquis of Hastings--who did not intend to be at Epsom on the Tuesday before the Derby--to scratch The Earl for his Derby engagement. Lord Hastings informed me that he had determined upon that course, as Lady Elizabeth had arrived safely at Epsom, and was to run in the Derby. In consequence, however, of a conversation I had had with the Duke of Beaufort, I did not comply with Lord Hastings' request, but returned to town for the purpose of representing to him the conversation which I had had with the Duke of Beaufort. The conversation was to the effect that his grace wished Lord Hastings to reconsider his intention of scratching The Earl, as his doing so would be unsatisfactory to the public. I faithfully represented this to Lord Hastings, who, notwithstanding, decided upon scratching the horse. This he himself did by writing a letter to Messrs. Weatherby, which was conveyed to them by Mr. Hill. Shortly after the letter had been sent, Lord Westmoreland came into Lord Hastings' room, where there were already Mr. Coventry, Captain Barlow, and some other gentlemen whose names I do not remember. Before leaving the room, I mentioned to Lord Westmoreland that I had reported to Lord Hastings the representation made by the Duke of Beaufort, but without effect; and I added that Lord Hastings had sent a letter to Messrs. Weatherby desiring them to scratch The Earl. I had no control over or interest in the horse, and I was no party to his being scratched; and Lord Hastings, in the presence of the gentlemen whose names I have mentioned, accepted the exclusive responsibility of the act. In conclusion, I beg most unhesitatingly to state that I had not betted one single shilling either on or against The Earl for his Derby engagement."

The trainers of Lady Elizabeth felt very much annoyed at the strong language which had been used by Admiral Rous in his letter to The Times, in which he asserted that Lord Hastings had been shamefully deceived (presumably by the Days), and that if he had seen the horse move "the bubble would have burst." An action at law was threatened by Mr. John Day, of Danebury, against the Admiral, but the threat never came to anything, as will be seen in the sequel; and here it may be proper to give Mr. Day's own explanation of the condition of Lady Elizabeth immediately previous to the date of the Derby. In his interesting work, "The Racehorse in Training," that gentleman explains "the mystery," which was, in fact, no mystery at all, the horse having, like many other horses, exhausted her form in her two-year-old career. It is only proper, however, that Mr. Day should speak for himself regarding Lady Elizabeth. He says, pages 156-7: "As a three-year-old she beat nothing. She ran four times and was never placed. Her first appearance in that year was for the Derby, her starting price in the betting being 7 to 4. No sporting man is likely ever to forget the sensation caused by her ignominious defeat. Nothing like it had been known for years or has been known since. All kinds of sinister reports were circulated. She had been poisoned; she had been pulled; she had been trained to death. Nor were these all, for amongst innumerable insinuations then in circulation, too base for repetition here, it was pretty freely said that every man in the stable, as well as every friend of those in it, had made a munificent fortune by rascality at the expense of the ever confiding and credulous British public, which had been unblushingly and grossly victimised, and as usual left to grumble and bear it. But when we come to the facts of the case we find that nothing was ever put forward to show that the mare was either improperly treated or neglected in any way, and I think that we have a right to assume that there was no ground for the complaints, but rather that credit should be given to those in charge of her for assiduity in everything that skill or experience could suggest for her well-being, and that the whole mystery may be summed up in these few words: no robbery took place, nor was one ever contemplated; the mare had simply lost her form--she was not so good as a three as she was as a two-year-old."

And certainly the man who trained the horse--and no man is more competent--should know, although it is never easy to knock a foregone conclusion out of the minds of a racing public very eager in general to believe the worst.

"But what, after all," continues Mr. Day, "it may be asked, was there so very different in Lady Elizabeth's running to that of hundreds of others of which nothing is heard afterwards?"

No doubt the very most that could be made was made by the public gossip-mongers, out of the "Lady Elizabeth Scandal," as it was called at the time. It is in some respects greatly to be regretted that a public investigation, in the interests of turf purity, did not take place. There can be no doubt that Admiral Rous thought he knew "something" more than was allowed to appear on the surface. Mr. Padwick made application to the Jockey Club for an investigation, but his request was not entertained as no charge had been made affecting his character. In these circumstances he wrote to the Admiral, asking that gentleman to reduce to some distinct form the imputations cast on him by the honourable gentleman's letter, so that he might meet and deal with him "in a manner which I have every confidence will induce you to acknowledge the injustice of those imputations, and withdraw the charges you have made against me."

The Admiral sent a prompt reply. It was in the following terms: "In answer to your letter, requesting me to reduce to some distinct form the imputation cast upon you respecting your connivance at scratching The Earl for the Derby after he was paraded at Epsom, and requiring me to withdraw the charges I have made against you, I shall be happy to do so if you will explain why The Earl (by your orders to Messrs. Weatherby) ran at Newmarket, in your name and colours, in the Biennial, and received forfeit in the match as 'Mr. Padwick's The Earl' against See Saw. If you had no interest in the horse, which you stated to me in your June letter, why were all the winnings, including the three Ascot Sweepstakes, paid to your account? These facts must be explained by Lord Hastings and yourself, under oath at the tribunal you have advised Mr. Day to appeal to; and wishing that you should exculpate yourself, and that you and Lord Hastings have been made the victims of a conspiracy, I am," etc.

Before going further, it may be as well to say regarding The Earl that, on its two-year-old form, according to "The Book," it did not seem to possess any great chance of winning the Derby; as a two-year-old it ran twelve races and won four of them. But as a three-year-old the horse made a better mark, as it won six times out of seven, beating Bluegown in the Newmarket Biennial referred to.

From the answer returned to the Admiral's letter, it became known that the Marquis of Hastings being under large pecuniary obligations to Mr. Padwick, that gentleman held some of the unfortunate nobleman's horses in his power, The Earl being included in the number--the particular bond of obligation being a "bill of sale." Mr. Padwick explains that the money won by The Earl--which it was thought prudent should run in his colours rather than those of the Marquis--was placed to a separate account at Weatherby's, "and every shilling appropriated by the Messrs. Weatherby to the payment of the forfeits and engagements of the horses sold to various persons by Lord Hastings, under Lord Exeter's conditions. Even the winnings of the animals I purchased at his public sale (one-third of which the Marquis became entitled to) were paid over to Messrs. Weatherby to the private account of the Marquis; and I have further contributed the sum of £1,400 out of my own pocket, up to this moment, to enable him to keep faith with the public."

The Admiral did not take the trouble to write a long reply to this letter; a few curt lines, returning "the enclosures" (letters received at different times from Messrs. Weatherby on the subject of his own account), were all that were vouchsafed.

Mr. Padwick, after the lapse of a fortnight, again addressed himself to Admiral Rous; but the latter gentleman, having evidently conceived a strong opinion on the case, only wrote in a way to indicate that to that opinion he was quite determined to adhere, as the following extract will show: "In your letter of the 30th of September you refer, among other matters, to a bill of sale from Lord Hastings to yourself. A copy of this document is now before me, and I am bound to tell you that, having regard to the terms and other circumstances of the case, I do not feel justified in saying more at present than that, for the sake of everybody, it is essential that the facts should be thoroughly sifted by the examination of all parties before the tribunal to which you yourself have advised Mr. Day to appeal."

But the facts of the case never were expiscated in any court of justice; the legal proceedings which Messrs. Vallance & Vallance had been instructed by Mr. John Day of Danebury to commence were never instituted, as the following brief letters will show.

From Mr. John Day to the editor of The Times:

"On the 16th of June last a letter appeared in your columns from Admiral Rous, under the title of 'Admiral Rous on the Turf,' containing reflections on me and my family. I have now to request the favour of your giving publicity to a letter which has been addressed to me by the Admiral, withdrawing his former letter, and a copy of which I beg to enclose."

The following is a copy of the letter referred to:

"As the legal proceedings pending between us have been stopped by you, I now withdraw my letter published in The Times newspaper on the 16th of June; and the fact of my having addressed a second letter to the editor on the same day requesting him not to insert the first, is a proof that I did not consider myself justified in desiring it to be published."