Gentlemen Riders 



Cup day of the Grand Military meeting held last year (1908) at 

 Sandown Park ; and assuredly never has the rider of the 

 winner been accorded a more enthusiastic reception than that 

 accorded to the popular young officer named above, when, on 

 the heavily weighted and little fancied Mount Prospects Fortune, 

 he galloped past the post four lengths ahead of Irish Wisdom, 

 who, three fences from home, looked to have the race at his 

 mercy. It was agreed on all sides that, taking into considera- 

 tion the weight (13 st.) his horse was carrying, and the heavy 

 state of the ground, Captain Paynter's was a very masterly 

 performance ; the judgment and patience which characterised 

 his riding throughout the race, and the determination with which 

 he sat down and rode from the last fence, being beyond praise. 



What made the victory all the more creditable, too, was 

 that Mount Prospects Fortune was far from being an easy 

 horse to ride. A bold and free jumper, he wanted a lot of 

 holding together at his fences, and unless his jockey had a firm 

 hold of his head and sat very quiet, he was apt to take off 

 too soon. 



Later on, the horse was very much fancied for the Grand 

 National, in spite of his weight, but he found the Liverpool 

 fences very different to those at Sandown, the tops of which 

 he could brush through with ease, and he duly came down. 



The next day Mount Prospects Fortune jumped the country 

 so well in cold blood that his owner may be excused for thinking 

 that if the Grand National could have been run the day after 

 learning this lesson, his horse would have won. 



Son of the late Major George Paynter and Frances Jannetta, 

 only daughter of Lord and Lady Cornelius Wentworth Beau- 

 clegh, the subject of our memoir was born on August 2nd, 1881, 

 and received his education at Eton, after which, in 1899, ^^ 

 joined the Scots Guards. 



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