AS A THREE-YEAR-OLD 



Dinner Stakes had been a match, and in the Duke 

 of York's Stakes at York he again had no more 

 than one to beat, an unworthy son of Persimmon 

 named Longboat, of whom so Httle was thought that 

 odds of 25 to I were laid on King WilHam. Prior 

 to the Princess of Wales's Stakes I think I may 

 give it as a fact that, amazing as it may now appear, 

 King William had beaten his owner's Swynford in a 

 trial, I chanced to meet Lord Derby at St. Pancras 

 Station the day after the Princess of Wales's Stakes, 

 which he had not been able to see, and told him that 

 I had backed King William, to which he replied 

 that there had been every justification for doing so, 

 though it will be seen that Swynford was the better 

 favourite. It is now plain that Prince Palatine at 

 this period was nothing like adequately appreciated, 

 or Lycaon would not have been in anything like 

 equal demand at Doncaster. I may frankly confess, 

 indeed, that at the time I by no means realised that 

 Prince Palatine was a really great horse. I had not 

 lost belief in King William, for the reason that I 

 knew how highly Mr. George Lambton regarded 

 him. Turning back again to my Circular Notes, I 

 find the following- comment on the Leger : "I was 

 wrong, it must be admitted, in my belief in King 

 William. If anything beat him I thought it would 

 certainly be Prince Palatine, but I did not think 

 anything would, that is to say I only entertained 



51 



