OTHER SEATS OF HORSE-RACING. 41 



Some racinof commentators have asserted that 

 racing began on Knavesmire, so early as 1709, 

 and that the races at once became successful. 

 The citizens, it is said, in that year " made a 

 collection, with which they purchased five plates, 

 which were run for over Knavesmire, and from 

 that period to the present the annual meetings 

 have been supported with much spirit." But 

 the first race contested on that now famous 

 course was in the year 1731. It was run on 

 Monday, August i6th, being for His Majesty's 

 100 gs. for six- year- old horses, etc., 12 St., four-mile 

 heats, the race being won by Lord Lonsdale's 

 c. h. Monkey, by his lordship's bay Arabian, 

 dam by Curwen's bay barb ; racing continued 

 throughout the whole week, four of the contests 

 being in four-mile heats, the other race being the 

 Ladies' Plate of ^60, for five-year-old horses, etc., 

 carrying 10 st. The racing, as established in 

 Yorkshire in 1709, took place over Clifton and 

 Rawcliffe Ings, about one and a half miles north 

 of the city. From that year onwards, racing was 

 kept up over the same course, and the reason 

 given for changing to the Knavesmire was the 

 races having on one occasion to be postponed on 

 account of the River Ouse having overflowed its 

 banks. 



It will, perhaps, give a good idea of the times 

 now spoken of, when it is stated that, during the 

 running over Clifton and Rawcliffe Ings, on 

 Monday, August 2nd, 17 14, when the race for a 

 gold cup of the value of ^60 was being de- 

 cided, an express arrived with news of the death 

 of Her Majesty the Queen (Anne), upon which 

 the nobility and gentry immediately left the field, 



