CHAPTERS FROM TURF HISTORY 



hour. As the pace was slow, Crucifix, who was last 

 off by two or three lengths, took up the running. 

 Coming down the hill Lalla Rookh, Welfare, and 

 Teleta drew near to the sky-blue and white cap, 

 when the trainer's anxiety was seen to be acute, 

 and in the straight it became a good race, Welfare 

 and Teleta being alongside the favourite. There 

 they stayed to the finish. Crucifix, fully extended, 

 winning by half a length. As the mare came 

 back to scale. Day observed with a significant 

 shake of the head, " That is well over," for he 

 knew she had really won on three legs. It was 

 a fine ending to a great career. The winner had 

 run in twelve races, had never been beaten, and 

 had won £18,287 in stakes. Bentinck received 

 £20,000 in bets over her Oaks victory — his betting 

 book showing three times that amount to the 

 mare's credit during her victorious life on the 

 Turf. 



At the stud Crucifix bred The Cowl (by Bay 

 Middleton), a good horse whose name is found 

 in the best pedigrees, and in 1845, having been 

 mated with Touchstone, produced Surplice, the first 

 winner of the Derby and the St. Leger since the 

 victories of Champion in 1800. Surplice, as is 

 well known, was included in Bentinck's stud, 

 which he sold across the breakfast table at Good- 

 wood one morning before the races in 1846 to 

 Mr. Mostyn for the sum of £10,000. Two years 

 later he groaned over his misfortune in the library 

 of the House of Commons — it was the day after 

 Surplice had won the Derby — and his biographer 

 has described the scene in words which have 

 become a familiar quotation. 



74 



