DANEBURY AND THE MARES 



200 yards, " Oh I do wish this infernal race was 

 over ! " was his agonised exclamation. No other 

 course can replace Stockbridge, and pleasant as the 

 Bibury Meeting at Salisbury may be the abandonment 

 of the old home of the Club will always be lamented 

 by those who knew it. 



During the tenancy of Mr. William Moore I lost 

 touch with Danebury, though much interested in Mr. 

 George Bulteel's great 'chaser Manifesto who was 

 trained there, but I resumed acquaintance with the 

 place when my friend Mr. Fred Withington came 

 into possession. Among the winners he produced 

 was Major Douglas Pennant's Rubio, whose career 

 was extraordinary. The horse, American bred, had 

 been turned out of training and lent to an innkeeper 

 at Towcester, who ran him in the station omnibus and 

 for a change let him out in a dog-cart. It is recorded 

 that a commercial traveller, innocent of racing know- 

 ledge, hearing doubt expressed as to whether Rubio 

 " stayed three miles " scornfully declared that there 

 could be no sort of doubt about it — he had driven the 

 horse thirty miles himself, more than once. I watched 

 the National in company with Mr. Withington from 

 the top of Lord Derby's stand, and surely no trainer 

 was ever more surprised than he when Rubio 

 won easily from Mattie Macgregor, a mare he also 

 trained and regarded as considerably the better of 

 the two. 



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