176 HORSE-RACING IN ENGLAND 



owners, even if they were gentlemen and even 

 noblemen, how to ' put on the screw ' when they 

 considered themselves ' forestalled ' in the gam- 

 bling market, and actually condescended, for 

 betting's sake, to carry on, in conjunction with 

 his trainer, Mr. John Kent (who relates the cir- 

 cumstances, with apparent admiration, in his 

 'Racing Life of Lord George Bentinck'), a 

 system of espionage in order to outwit a miser- 

 able stable-boy, who had been detected in ' letting 

 the cat out of the bag,' instead of dismissing the 

 traitor on the spot, as a ' fine old English gentle- 

 man ' should have done at all risks. Lord George, 

 moreover, was fond of making questionable and 

 even rather revolting experiments with his horses ; 

 as, for instance, when he put a filly less than a 

 year old to the stud, and when (if, which is 

 doubtful, Mr. W. Day's ' Reminiscences ' are to 

 be taken as unimpeachable evidence) he used his 

 horse Naworth not much more humanely than 

 the notorious Mr. Tregonwell Frampton is sup- 

 posed (unjustly, there is some reason to believe) 

 to have treated his horse Dragon. 



That Lord George, nevertheless, conferred 

 many benefits upon the race-going public must 



