34 RACEHORSES IN AUSTRALIA 



race; Derrit on Carbine lost it. The latter rider struck his mount (Carbine) 

 with his whip on a tender spot, and paralysed him for the moment. 



The Flying Stakes (seven furlongs), the Foal Stakes (a mile and a 

 quarter), beating iMelos and Wycombe, fell to him at the same Spring Meeting 

 at Flemington. Then followed a couple of defeats. Carbine, now the 

 property of Mr. Donald Wallace, ran third in the Newmarket, carrying eight 

 stone twelve, to Sedition, a six-year-old mare with seven three on her back, 

 and Lochiel, an aged horse, with nine four. Mick O'Brien always maintained 

 that he should have won this race upon Carbine. It was well known that 

 O'Brien was a partner in another of the runners (Tradition), and he was 

 fancied. Carbine's jockey was determined that he would beat his own horse 

 at all costs — otherwise, what would the mob say? — and kept the big bay well 

 shepherded. When Tradition was palpably unable to come along, O'Brien 

 clapped on full sail, and came too late. "I should be punished, flogged," he 

 confessed, after weighing in. In the Australian Cup, Lochiel, giving in actual 

 weight a pound, got home from the three-year-old by three parts of a neck. 

 At weight-for-age Carbine would have received eighteen pounds. The colt 

 now won the Champion Stakes, three miles, in a very slow run race, from 

 Abercorn, Melo^, Volley, Lonsdale and Cyclops. Next day he secured, very 

 easily indeed, the All-Aged Stakes at a mile, and, on the same day, the Loch 

 Plate, tv/o miles, by half a head from Lochiel and Carlyon, Carbine carrying 

 a fourteen pound penalty. 



In Sydney, at the Autumn Meeting, in glorious weather, Abercorn beat 

 the champion in the Autumn Stakes, a mile and a half, and The Australian 

 Peer, Lochiel and Cranbrook were behind the pair. Next day, in the Sydney 

 Cup, two miles. Carbine, nine stone, won by a head from Melos, eight stone 

 two, with Abercorn third, nine four, two lengths away, and Lochiel, nine two, 

 eighth. "At the half-mile post Lady Lyon somev/hat interfered with Carbine, 

 causing him to drop back last. Time, 3 min. 31 sec." 



Next day Carbine won the All-Aged (a mile) from Rudolph, Russley, 

 Lochiel and Melos, and later in the afternoon beat Lochiel in the Cumberland 

 Stakes, two miles, with Abercorn third. Carbine won by half a head, as you 

 will see if you turn up the Turf Register of the day. What that useful work 

 does not tell you, however, is this: Five furlongs from home the race looked 

 a gift for Carbine, and all the books were laying "ten to one Lochiel." At 

 this moment Carbine nearly fell, and dropped astern a prodigious long way. 

 Old Mr. Sam Cook, the owner of The Admiral, hearing the fielders still calling 

 "ten to one Lochiel," dashed in and took all the hundreds to ten he could 

 gather. Running back to the Lawn again he came in sight of the winning post 

 just in time to see Carbine put in the most paralysing run perhaps ever seen, 

 and just catch the leader on the post. One who was down the running tells 

 how, sweeping round the bend. Carbine was literally "ventre a terre," his belly 

 almost touching the grass. The last half was run under 48 seconds. It was 

 a falsely run race, the two miles taking them five minutes and three seconds. 

 On the last day of the meeting, Mr. Wallace's colt again beat Abercorn — 

 half a length — Melos, Lochiel, Volley and Bluenose, in the Australian Jockey 

 Club Plate, three miles. 



And so ended his three-year-old career. The next season opened for 

 him in the Spring with the Caulfield Stakes. Mr. James White's three-year-old 

 Dreadnought beat him two lengths over the mile and a furlong, and Mr. White 

 with Abercorn, and Mr. Gannon, by the aid of Melos, stood in Carbine's 

 way in the Melbourne Stakes. But only a short head and half a neck 

 separated the three. Ah! there was racing in the days of these mighty giants. 



