view raw text
ROGUES AND THEIR WAYS English Trainer, P. P. Gilpin, Discusses the Handling of Them. Does Not Think that Blinkers or Any Other Device Can Overcome Fundamental Weaknesses of Yiclous or Intractable Horses. The rogue has always been a great problem to trainers of thoroughbreds and to jockeys as well. All sorts of devices have been used in an effort to overcome the viciousness and Intractability of these horses, but none has met with any real success. The views of P. P. Gilpin, one of Englands leading trainers, on this subject are contained in the following article, which is reprinted from the London "Weekly Disptach: Rogues arc most unsatisfactory horses to deal with because you. really never know what they are going to do. One day your rogue is feeling good and he makes a laughing stock of all your horses by running away from them. Tou natter yourself that you have got hold of a good animal, a real "money spinner," that looks like doing you many good turns. But he usually dispels all these fond hopes a few days later on the training ground by behaving as badly as he Jiad done well on the previous occasion. - Tou then start wondering what on earth is the best tiling to do with him. You put a different man on him to ride him at exercise, and find the result exactly the same one day a good horse and another no good at alL Tou then resort to blinkers, which prevent him from seeing behind him and restrict the scope of his vision all round. It has a good effect on some horses, but on others it has no effect at alL DOES NOT JAWE BUNKERS. Personally, I do not care very much for "blinkers, and seldom have I resorted to their use. It is merely a matter of opinion, of course, and I admit that many good judges I have known have placed great faith in their efficacy. The colonial, and especially the American trainers I have seen, both in England and on the other side of the Atlantic, use them freely, and I have seen a good many of the best trainers use them frequently enough with good results. But, as showing that I am not alone in my antipathy to the general use of blinkers, the late Danny Maher, who was one of the "best jockeys we have had in this country during my time, strongly objected to their use, and I have known occasions on which lie declined to ride if blinkers were to be -worn on the horse, this especially applying if the course was round a turn. St. Amant was a horse that I can call to mind as winning the Derby wearing blinkers, and I believe his ears were also stopped with cotton-wool on that occasion. He was not a good-tempered horse at that time and also was rather under suspicion of not being juite generous. Anyhow, the methods adopted appear to have been of great assistance to liim on that Derby day. as there was a most tremendous storm of wind and rain while the race was being run, accompanied by terrific thunder. No doubt, therefore, the blinkers and the cotton-wool protected him to a certain extent from the exceeding inclemency of the weather. It was also supposed that the thunder rather frightened him into doing liis best, and he certainly put up the best performance of his career. The thunder on this occasion seems to have had the same effect upon him as a gardener of mine once laughingly said that it had upon women. I met him coming out of the kitchen after a big thunderstorm which had frightened all my servants almost to death. He was laughing heartily and attracted my attention, so I asked him what caused him so much merriment at such a moment, and He said he was laughing at the women servants, who were all frightened by the storm. I told him I thought he ought to sympathize with them rather than laugh at them. He laughed again and said he had been recalling a saying of his fathers that "thunder made good women." I asked him how his father arrived at that conclusion, and his reply was: 1t frightened the devil out of them." This is what appears to have happened to SL Amant when he won the Derby. St. Amant was trained by Alfred Hoyhoe, who was an Englishman. And another horse that, I think, ran in blinkers when he won. the Derby was Ard Patrick, which was trained by another Englishman, the late Sam Darling, acknowledged to be one of the most capable and successful trainers of our times. Both of these trainers used blinkers frequently with great success. Huggins, the American trainer who was here for many years training for Lord William Beresford, Mr. Whitney, Major Loder and others, almost invariably used them and Joyner, who trained for Harry Payne Whitney, was also a great believer in them. But 1 look upon them as being of valuable assistance only in exceptional cases where the horse is a rogue, rather than as a cure for roguery, and, like all other things that are used regularly, I think they very soon lose their value. ItOGTJES A NUISANCE. Rogues are a nuisance in more ways than one. They invariably do what you least expect them to do, and always excel themselves on the most important occasions and so create a great deal of heartburning and disappointment. As long as a horse is not -wicked you can put up with it fairly well, hut when he combines bad temper and real -wickedness with his roguery it is another matter altogether. And generally the sooner one gets rid of such animals the better, as they without doubt corrupt others. I remember a few years ago seeing several horses belonging to Colonel Hall Walker he is now Lord Wavertree fighting with one another on the edge of the Limekilns at Newmarket, like a lot of terriers. There were three, if not four, of them down on their knees and they were attacking each other with their teeth and heels fighting tooth and Tiail in fact really meaning to hurt and it was a rather terrifying spectacle. I know that the trainer who had them at the time took care to be armed with a thick stick or a broomhandle before he went into the box to see them, one of them especially. I believe that they were by the now defunct Soyal Realm, which would have, no doubt, been a successful sire but for his unfortunate habit of transmitting his bad temper to so many of his progeny. His offspring were almost invariably good looking, but nearly always doomed their owners to disappoint ment by reason of their excitability and variable, temperament I had a horse called Skikaree, which became bad-tempered quite suddenly and, so far as I know, absolutely without any cause whatever, and on one occasion I remember his throwing his boy off and going for him open-mouthed while on the ground. It was fortunate for the lad that I was only a few yards off and immediately proceeded to his assistance and beat off his assailant. We could never trust that horse again, and 1 took the first opportunity of getting rid of him. Once a horse becomes savage he is rarely any good to anyone afterwards, and least of all on a race-course. I had no need to regret having parted with him as he never did any good. There was a horse called Muley Edris that once savaged the late Fred Archer badly at exercise one morning at Newmarket, , when ho bit his arm so severely that he was unable to ride for a considerable time. Without a book of reference I cannot at the moment bo sure whether that horse ever won a race afterwards, but, if he did, I am inclined to think it was one of only small account. Archer, though badly injured, had a marvelous escape on this occasion, when he was viciously attacked indeed and without any warning whatever. I had a man in my employ some years ago he is now minding stallions at Kennnett who had his thumb bitten off before he came to me, but though he often told mo about it, I cannot remember the name of the horse. A CASE IN POINT. I recall when I was a boy at school having gone to see a big steeplechase at Bristol ; it was the biggest race over a country in England with the sole exception of the Grand National, and it was run and won in almost exactly similar conditions to those in which St Amant won the Derby. The horse on this occasion was a grey called Scots Grey, that belonged to Colonel Brown of the Scots Greys, out of the ranks of which regiment he had purchased the horse that afterwards turned out one of the best steeplechase horses of his day. He was ridden by Garrett Moore, had blinkers on and his ears were stuffed with cotton-wool, both measures which no doubt protected the animal to a great extent from the violence of the storm. The horse was of a cantankerous disposition and was seldom of any account except when ridden by Garrett Moore, who was a past master in the art of riding a rogue. One of the finest horsemen I have ever seen. Mr. Moore combined brains with great strength, both of which he brought into instant play when required. I always thought one of the chief reasons why Mr. Moore was so successful in his riding and treatment of rogues was that he always seemed to have an intimate knowledge of what they were going to do, and invariably anticipated their intentions and thus successfully frustrated them on almost every occasion. In fact, he had such a confidence in his own powers and rightly so that he usually got hold of a rogue whenever he got the chance, though I think it was really more in anticipation of getting the pleasure of "besting" them than with any real idea of profiting by his wonderful handling of them. HOUSES WITH LIKES AND DISLIKES. Some horses have strong likes and dislikes, so much so that they will not do anything for some people while they will do their best willingly for others. Perhaps one of the most notable of such cases in the last twenty-five years was that of Diamond Jubilee, which belonged to the late King Edward, when he was Prince of Wales. That horse was so intractable and stupid with other jockeys that he was eventually handed over to the care of Herbert Jones to ride in the great races, owing to both "Moray" Cannon and the late John Watts both of whom were at the top of the tree as jockeys at that time being quite unable to manage him. "Bertie" Jones, who at that time was only a lad and weighed very little over 98 pounds, won the Two Thousand Guineas, the Newmarket Stakes, the Eclipse Stakes and the St Leger, all on Diamond Jubilee, and deserved the greatest possible credit for his management of the horse. There is no doubt in my mind that Diamond Jubilee had taken a dislike to both Watts and Cannon. Anyhow, he certainly succeeded in defeating both of them and I think they were glad when the responsibility of riding him was handed over to the beginner "Bertie" Jones. ANOTHER EXPLANATION. Of course, there is another way of looking at it The horse may have taken a fancy to the boy who had such pluck and nerve, and this may have influenced him as much as, or more than, any dislike for the other jockeys of the stable. Be that as it may, there is no doubt that the partnership between "Bertie" Jones and Diamond Jubilee was most successful. I have often wondered why Jones did not get the patronage to which, in my opinion, his obvious ability entitled him to expect For, although he rode for the Prince of Wales and subsequently for King Edward and King George, I do not think there is any question that he ever got the amount of riding to which his undoubted integrity and capability entitled him. As in many other things in this life, fashion has a great deal to answer for, and I can only account for it in that way. You hear followers of the turf one day eulogizing a jockey or trainer, neither of whom can do wrong in their eyes. But shortly afterwards j-ou will hear them roundly condemned by those who before were loudest in their praises. They can neither ride nor train for "nuts."
