210 PETERSBURG IN WINTER 



and owners as a rule like this time arrangement, because it 

 obviates the disagreeable possibility of their horses being put 

 alongside animals driven by Americans. Poor Fred Archer 

 often excited the same feeling among his opponents. The 

 races, whether trotting or galloping, cause little enthusiasm, 

 and there is not a single evening paper that gives the 

 winners. 



Flat racing in Russia is carried on in very poor style. 

 Several waifs and strays of our turf hang on to it, because 

 they cannot get a job anywhere else ; and a few good English 

 jockeys, having been lured by false hopes or deceptive 

 representations, find themselves riding in that country butf 

 not for long. All whom I met had the same story of dis- 

 appointment, and discontent with the uncivil and contemptuous 

 way they were treated by the racing officials, and members 

 of the racing clubs. In England, jockeys are made much of 

 by all classes, and quite right too ; because the game they 

 play is one of great responsibility, and demands skill, courage, 

 coolness and readiness of resource under very trying circum- 

 stances. In Russia, they are not entitled to wear uniform, 

 and are consequently regarded as moujiks (recently emanci- 

 pated serfs), who have to bow and scrape to every Jack in 

 Office they meet. I was therefore not surprised at reading 

 in a recent issue of The Sportsman the following remarks on 

 the illness of H. Madden, who had been riding in Russia :-^ 

 "The climate in Russia is so much against the English } 

 people that during the last four years no fewer than eight 

 young jockeys and trainers have died there, viz., jockeys, 

 W. Kidd, H. Wilson, A. Epps, E. Kitchener, H. Chandler, 

 and the trainers Bray, Gillam, and Heslop. I cannot under- 

 stand why good jockeys go to Russia at all, when they are 

 needed in other countries, especially a good jockey like H. 

 Madden. I was surprised to learn as a fact that jockeys in 

 Moscow and St. Petersburg rode for the fee of i a losing 



