DANEBURY DAYS 



this episode, every particular of which must be 

 well known to all interested in Turf matters ; I 

 yield to no one in the respect and admiration in 

 which I hold the memory of the great Dictator ; 

 but there is no gainsaying the fact that he could 

 not safely be trusted with a pen, as he rarely took 

 one in hand without committing himself. Here is 

 the letter in question : — 



Admiral Rous on thk Tukf 

 To the Editor of the Times. 



Sir — Observing in your paper of to-day the following para- 

 graph, quoted from the Pall Mall Gazette : " The Sporting^ 

 Life, with more audacity, mentions what Admiral Rous said 

 on the course, that if he had taken as much laudanum as 

 had been given to the mare he would have been a dead man," 

 permit me to state that it is perfectly untrue. My belief is that 

 Lady Elizabeth had a rough spin with Athena in March, 

 when the Days discovered she had lost her form — a very 

 common occurrence with fillies which have been severely 

 trained at two years old ; that when the discovery was made 

 they reversed a commission to back her for the One Thou- 

 sand Guineas Stakes at Newmarket, and they declared that 

 Lord Hastings would not bring her out before the Derby, 

 on which he stood to win a great stake. I am informed that 

 when Lord Hastings went to Danebury to see her gallop 

 they made excuses for her not to appear. If he had seen 

 her move, the bubble Avould have burst. But the touters 

 reported, " She was going like a bird '' ; oClO will make any 

 horse fly if the trainer wishes it to rise in the market. She 

 has never been able to gallop the whole year. Lord Hastings 

 has been shamefully deceived, and with respect to scratching 

 The Earl, Lord Westmorland came up to town early on 

 Tuesday from Epsom to beseech Lord Hastings not to 

 commit such an act. On his arrival in Grosvenor Square he 

 met Mr. Hill going to Weatherby's with the order in his 

 pocket to scratch The Earl, and Mr. A. Pad wick closeted 

 with Lord Hastings, In justice to the Marquis of Hastings 

 I state that he stood to win ^£^35,000 by The Earl, and did 

 not hedge his stake money. Then you will ask, " Whv did 



95 



