view raw text
MATCH RACING IN OLD-TIME ENGLAND. Vast Sums Won and Lost Over Such Events Novel Combination Matches. Matches are almost .unknown in the horse racing world of today, but they were common enough in the good old days before the sorry mating of racing with business. A match was a truly spoiling event: stakes were heavy, vast sums were bet and the excitement of the nice would stir the whole nation. So much property was lost by the "gentlemen or he south" to the "gentlemen of the north" over a match run at Newmarket at the dawn of the eighteenth century, says the London Evening Standard, that the statute of ijueen Anne was enacted to restrict betting. Yet in 1750 a Captain Shartou won ,000 by winning a bet that he would not complete fifty miles in two hours with as many horses as he pleased. And in 1800 the sporting and gallant Colonel .Mellish lost bets to the tune or 00,000 in a match Tor 10,000 his horse breaking down when victory seemed assured. When in 17!i:i Sir II. Vane-Tempests Hamblctonian was matched against Diamond for 0,001 at Newmarket, the place was so crowded with visitors that not a bed was to be had within twenty miles. Due hundred thousand people assembled to see a lady ride 111 a match at York in 1801 against a sportsman of celebrity and ,000,000 was said at the least to depend 011 the result. The ladys horse nearly tueny years old -was beaten. The last of these memorable sporting events to arouse an interest through the whole country took place in 1.S..I when Lord Islingtons Flying Dutchman beat Lord Zetlands Voltiguer at York. A great deal of money has changed hands over matches in which riders have undertaken to cover twenty miles in the hour, a feat often performed successfully. A great performance was that of u featherweight jockey who. at Newmarket in 17.SI! rode a horse twenty-three miles in two or three minutes under the hour. The Earl of March. "Old .." was on the winning side of a sporting match for ,000 in 1750, when "a carriage with four running wheels and a person in it" was to be drawn by four horses nineteen miles in an hour. The match was won in fifty-three minutes and twenty-seven seconds, and a grand sight it must have been to see the four horses and their riders setting up such a record. A great ride was that of a Mr. Lipscoinbe, who. in 1821, carried ninety miles in four hours and fifty-three minutes on eight horses. That famous all round sportsman. Squire Osbaldeston, performed a marvelous feat in 18:il when, having undertaken to ride 1100 miles in ten hours for ,000 a side, to say nothing of bets, he finished in eight hours and thirty-nine minutes "as gay as a lark." He was forty-four years of age and weighed over eleven stone, yet one of his twenty-eight horses carried him four miles in eight minutes. For several riders the claim has been made that they have ridden 1,000 miles in 1,000 successive hours; and in 1801 J. Da vies drove one horse in 11 dog cart 1,000 miles in nineteen days, an average of fifty-two miles a day. Some very old matches find a place in the annals of the turf and the road. Has not Newmarket Heath seen "geese races" in the days of Lords Rockingham and OrfordV At York, in the middle of the eighteenth century, a trick rider rode one mile standing upright 011 horseback for 00; he was allowed three minutes and rode home with eighteen seconds in hand. At the end of the century an officer trotted 15 miles from Chelmsford to Dunuiow in 1 hour 0 minutes, his face to his horses tail. In 1800 a naval officer rode a blind horse around Sheerness race course for a wager, the conditions being that he should not touch the reins with his hands. This however, did not prevent him from having the reins fastened to his feet. To walk fifty miles, drive fifty miles and ride fifty miles in twenty-four consecutive hours was a task that Captain Polhill easily accomplished in 18110 with nearly five hours to spare. In our own time, 1801, J. II. Kadeliffc succeeded in rowing a quarter of a mile and in swimming, running, cycling and riding a horse the same distance all within the space of fifteen minutes. Merely to think, of such a feat is enough to make ouc tired.
