" PAVO " AND CHATTANOOGA 257 



latter half of the nineteenth century. We must now 

 come among the really business journalists. 



By way of contrast there was old "Pavo" (Langley) 

 of The Morning Post, who had no real knowledge about 

 horses, and certainly no capacity to write English, but 

 by a certain obtrusiveness had for long thrust himself 

 into a position of some fictitious importance. It is best, 

 I suppose, to hold on to the old maxim, " De mortuis nil 

 nisi bonum," and leave him with the old Chattanooga 

 story to his debit. That story is absolutely true, for 

 the incident occurred in my presence. " Pavo " had 

 come to see the Cobham yearlings in 1875 or 1876 

 I forget which and the manager, the late Mr Richard 

 Bell, in a foolish moment, had the eighteen-year-old 

 Chattanooga brought out and shown to him as one 

 of the best Blair Athol colts. "Pavo" took copious 

 notes of the old horse, while the manager kept calling 

 attention to his good points. Finally, however, Mr 

 Bell burst out laughing, and said : " Why, you old fool, 

 it's Chattanooga ! " 



On that the wrath of Mr Langley was such that he 

 went straight away back to the station and "crabbed" 

 the Cobham Stud for ever afterwards. I, whose sole 

 offence was that I was present and could not help 

 laughing, shared in the condemnation as long as poor 

 old " Pavo " lived 



It might be easy enough to play a similar trick on 

 almost anybody with a backward two-year-old or even 

 three-year-old, but Chattanooga, at the time mentioned, 

 looked even more than his age, with a tremendous crest, 

 and no human being who knew anything about blood 

 stock could have been taken in as " Pavo" was. 



By way of contrast I recall old Cole, of The Field, 



