54 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER 



colt was b}^ no means among the first. Yet so 

 adroit was Captain Yernon in hedging his bets, that 

 if one of the two colts that made it a dead-heat had 

 beaten, our master would on that occasion have won 

 ten thousand pounds ; as it was he lost nothing, nor 

 would in any case have lost anything. In the lan- 

 guage of the Turf, he stood ten thousand pounds to 

 nothing ! — a fact so extraordinary to ignorance and 

 so splendid to poverty ! ' 



Holcroft began betting next morning, and by the 

 end of the week had lost half a year's wages. ^ 



' In 1824, Eobinson the jockey made a wager (in ' 

 which he obtained good long odds) that he would in 

 that year, and within the week, win the Derby and 

 Oaks races, and also get married : all three some- 

 what problematical occurrences, the chances of suc- 

 cess as regards the two first events being a matter 

 determined by a mathematical calculation, and the 

 latter, we presume, being almost reduced to a cer- 

 tainty by previous courtship. Of course the chances 

 were in favour of those who laid odds, but on 

 this occasion the odds were floored; for Robinson 

 won the Derby on Cedric, the Oaks on Cobweb, and 

 his wife — no, what we mean to say is, and he also 

 got married within the week.' ^ 



William Scott, who died in October 1848, was 

 another celebrated jockey, who, in his day, had no 



' Memoirs «f Thmyias Holcroft. 

 ' Horse-Ilacing, its Ilistor?/, &c. 



