Gentlemen Riders 



first time. I backed Mon Roi again for ;^900, and he started 

 at 4 to I. So that was all right. 



" At the station, I remember, one irate gentleman shook his 

 fist at me and called me a very odd name, but he ran away so 

 quickly that I had no time to ask him what it meant." 



In the same year Lord Cholmondeley won the Final Plate 

 at Manchester (then a gentleman rider's race), on a little horse 

 called Mervyn, bred and trained in Ireland, who started at a 

 nice price. 



Owing to his weight being prohibitive, he rode but seldom 

 in races over a country. He won two, however, on the same 

 day, once on Father O'Flynn, and on Aintree, respectively, 

 and was second in two steeplechases on the same horses at the 

 Beaufort Hunt meeting the day before. 



Father O'Flynn is thus described by Lord Cholmondeley: 

 "He was a lovely little horse to ride ! Such a jumper ! I 

 never saw a better. I don't think he ever fell in a race, and 

 he ran over every sort of course. I taught him to jump at my 

 place in Cheshire, but could not get him over anything till 

 I put blinkers on him, he was so very tricky." 



Weasel was a useful horse on whom Lord Cholmondeley 

 won several Hunters' races on the flat, including one at Croxton 

 Park, where the money was put down freely ; and at Derby he 

 had a real good race on a horse called Oak. 



"I had worked very hard to do the weight" (says Lord 

 Cholmondeley), "and only did it in a i lb. saddle, so I thought 

 I was fairly entitled to keep the business to myself, particularly 

 as I had got a small 'parcel' on S.P. We won quite com- 

 fortably, and the horse was sold after the race. A very 

 delicate animal, we only got him ready for the one race, and 

 I don't think he ever won another." 



Another good performance of his was in a five-furlong race 



300 



