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IN LITTLE OLD NEWMARKET 1 Happenings in Englands Home of Thoroughbred Racers Aristocracy of Great Britain to be Found : at CInb Headquarters "With Good Company Close By. The special commissioner for All Sports "Weekly paid a visit to Newmarket, the home of racing in England, and his impressions of the town, the training grounds and the daily life of the people in the quiet days between the big race meetings, are well worth reading. He had the pleasure of friendly conversations with a few representative trainers and odd interviews with visitors and townsfolk. Little Old Newmarket, as Major Belmonts emissary from New York would call it, Beemed to bo almost asleep when I arrived. I was told later that the populations of the urban district is not far short of 10,000 It was once 11,500 but none of the 10,000 hurried out to welcome me. In my evening walk up High Street I counted not more than a dozen people six in one county and half a dozen in the other. This, by the way, occurred to me to be Newmarkets first lesson to the stranger within her gates the importance of having a bit on both sides, if any. Half the town is In Cambridgeshire and the other half in Suffolk ; and three or four parishes meet within the area of the racing capital. "So this is Newmarket," I said to myself, as I went to bed in a room dating almost as far back as the battle of Naseby. But it wasnt. It wasnt the real Newmarket; it was only one side of it. The town that seemed asleep as I came into it in the evening was very much alive in the morning. Everybody was up and about horse and foot before I heard the call of Tour hot water, sir." THE OLD AND THE NEW. There was still an old-world atmosphere about the cobbled courtyard of the modernized hotel. One had an impression that "The Three Musketeers" might at any moment dash in by one carriage-way and out at the other. But in High Street, on the heath, and on the other exercise grounds provided by the jockey club, the real twentieth century life of Newmarket had begun for the day. -v It is here, in this early morning work, that you have the key to the purpose and occupation of this great training center this home of the thoroughbred. Perhaps there is no other town in England so completely dependent on one industry as Newmarket is. There are certainly few other towns that take their business more seriously. The Newmarket seen by the racegoer the gay and sporting crowd of the stands and en-closcures at the spring or July or October meetings bears little relation to the Newmarket of- the in-between weeks. Even when the last special train has left for London and the last motor car or charabanc or taxicab is bowling away beyond Six Mile Bottom, there is still, on race meeting days, an air of feverish excitement about the town in the evening. The -hotels and inns are over-full ; guests are being "slept out" in private houses ; the public-house bars are doing a refreshing trade, and the clubs tradesmens and political are keeping up their reputations for sociability. AFTER THE RACES Members of the racing aristocracy are assembled at the Jockey Club headquarters in the High Street. Perhaps the King is there for the night. He has his own rooms, and his own private entrance and carriage drive. There is good company at the Subscription Rooms next door the club rendezvous of trainers and jockeys and parties are being entertained at the handsome mansions of racehorse owners and other wealthy patrons of the turf anywhere between Exning and Moulton Paddocks or Cheveley. That is when races are on, and now and then in the hunting season. But in between the big events Newmarket, after sunset, but for the sober sociability of its few clubs and institutes and the through traffic of the motor car, is a village of the pre-Stuart period again, bursting into twentieth century life miraculously at sunrise next morning and in the evening relapsing into its old-time tranquility. Walk across the heath before breakfast any morning or stand near the town end of Cambridge Road, and "squadronettes" of shiny-coated colts and fillies will pass you at Intervals, ridden by stable lads and jockeys and apprentices. Some are taking easy walking exercises, a few sprinters will do short gallops on the flat or. alongside Cambridge Road five-eighths or so. A more advanced group of stayers, due to run in long-distance races shortly, will be given severer work a mile or mile and a quarter gallop or more in twos and threes. There are, for instance, S. H. Darlings first string Lieutenant and Golden Boss, Courier and Cragsman, among the three-year-olds, and others owned by Lord Bland-fcrd, Lord Hillingdon and Sir Samuel Scott. Darragh, Page Three, Soldennis and Smoke Screen, are in the string from Hill Cottage stables, where Lord George Dundas trains for his father. Lord Zetland, for Sir Hedworth Meux, Sir Thomas Dixon and Lord and Lady Fitzwilliam. HOW THE HORSES COME. Mr. Gilpin has brought Town Guard, Knockando and Greek Bachelor from Clare-haven, a mile away on the other side of the town, and among the Hon. George Lambtons, first string on this special Saturday morning visit to the race course siue are Highbrow, Pharos, Moabite and Silurian all Lord Derbys animals with Lord Wolvertonsj Night Patrol and Dry Gin. ir you are interested in any of Mr. Frank Curzons horses follow the Primrose House string, under Mr. Watts. Bellman has just galloped a mile ahdjthree-quarters with Sun-blair Challoner .up-accompanying him on the last six furlongs. "Soval, Jimmy Valentine and Well Beloved have done a fast five furlongs on the flat. Cannons Double Hackle and World Dominion are also out, but only doing a snails gallop. AH the hardest gallops for horses in advanced stages of training must be done before the sun is too high, in the sky and too hot. "At four or five or six oclock on a golden summer morn," the hard-working trainer and his stable staff must be out with "the first string." The second lot are out between nine and eleven, doing lighter work generally. These are mostly colts and fillies with no early racing engagements to fulfill "here and there a two-year-old, and here and there a yearling," just broken in. Felix Leach, Jr., is out with Tittenhurst and Dusky Maid and Americus Boy, with some of Mr. Kings horses and others owned by Mr. and Mrs. S. W. Beer. Farther afield we may see some of the Kings horses, from Egerton House stables, away beyond the Dyke and the July course. But of these, more later. Hurry away to the Bury side of the town. Here also there are great training grounds i the Long Gallop, Warren Hill, the New Grounds and farther north the open fields known as the Limekilns. Most of the heath j land on this side. I am told, once belonged to i the Duke of Rutland, who leased it to the i Jockey Club for a period of years. The Lime- kilns land belongs to the Chippenhami Estate Mrs. Thorpe and is hired by the Jockey I Club.
