AND TIMES OF JOHN OSBORNE 185 



of the horses who are likely to start, and some of which 

 are not unhkely to take a prominent part in the Derby. 

 It was, therefore, justi on the cards that he would have 

 * had a skinner.' But even if the worst had come to the 

 worst, he could not have lost a thousand pounds on his 

 Derby book as it stood at the time of his death, and such 

 a sum was a mere flea-bite to a man with his business, 

 and he could have squared that round in the ' fiddling ' 

 operations of any afternoon at Tattersall's. The real 

 cause of the disaster was a brain hereditarily predisposed 

 to disease, and excited into action by the imbibition of 

 ardent spirits in large quantities. We have many a 

 time seen him toss off a large glass of neat brandy and 

 call for another glass instanter. In everything he 

 seemed to throw himself heart and soul. 



" Even the last dread act of all was not half 

 done, it was thoroughly done; he cut his throat 

 right across from one ear nearly to the other — a 

 more frightful gash was seldom seen, and never 

 before inflicted by any person upon himself. " The 

 deed, too, was not only determined, but it was 

 premeditated — nay, even proclaimed. On the day 

 before, he dined with one of his most intimate friends, 

 and told liim in the most undisguised language possible 

 that the next morning he meant to cut his throat. When 

 his friend remonstrated with him upon the folly of 

 making jokes upon such serious matters, he told him it 

 was no joke at all, but that he meant to carry his threat 

 into execution, and, indeed, admitted that he should 

 have done so the week before — shaving wandered into the 

 fields for the very purpose — but that there were a lot of 

 roughs about who would have picked his pockets, as 

 there was no ' bobby ' in view who could have protected 

 his carcase from spohation ; and he significantly added 



