Racing Career 



.£12,000, and had that gentleman been on the spot there is 

 little doubt that the offer would have been accepted. As it 

 was, Mr. Yates, being unable to communicate with Mr. Leigh 

 at the moment, and not caring to take so heavy a responsibility 

 on his own shoulders without first consulting his principal, the 

 offer fell through, with the result that Captain Machell had to 

 make the best of a bad bargain, as the saying is, and put up 

 for once with what he could get, which in this instance was a 

 solitary bet of five thousand to a thousand. 



" And not bad business either," as Mr. Richardson once 

 remarked to the writer, "seeing that Disturbance, Reugny, and 

 Defence only cost him ^1200, when I bought these for him 

 originally at the Ayr meeting a little over a year previously." 



How religiously he kept his word as regards his vow not 

 to ride in public again can be well understood by any one at 

 all acquainted with John Maunsell Richardson, the only time 

 he ever appeared again in the once favourite white jacket and 

 dark-blue cap being when he took part in a private sweep- 

 stake in Croxton Park, on which occasion he rode a hunter of his 

 own, which he had hunted down, the race eventually falling to 

 his friend, the late Mr. Hugh Owen, whose mount, belonging 

 to himself, started favourite in a large field and won easily. 



Soon after Reugny's victory in the Grand National, Captain 

 Machell sold the pick of his steeplechasers, including Dis- 

 turbance, Reugny, and Defence, for a large sum, to the late Mr. 

 Gerard Leigh, by whom they were sent down to Luton Hoo, 

 his place in Bedfordshire. It will hardly be believed that one 

 fine day, in order to provide amusement for the home party, 

 the whole fleet were brought out, and, with hanging reins 

 attached, were jumped'-over leaping bars erected for the occasion, 

 with the result that Disturbance, at all events, was irretrievably 

 ruined, and never ran again, whilst the others suffered more 



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