194 ^ MIRROR OF THE TURF. 



other. Some are on the scene from pure love 

 of sport, others from their desire to bet, and 

 when a race is decided, especially one of the 

 great handicaps which give rise to so much 

 betting, tens, nay, hundreds of thousands of 

 pounds will have been lost and won, the sum 

 total being of course made up by a vast number 

 of small and many large transactions. 



Varied estimates have been formed of the 

 amount annually expended in betting or horse- 

 racing. At the Doncaster St. Leger Meeting, 

 which lasts four days, there will probably be 

 thirty races run, from four to fifteen horses 

 competing in each. To accommodate the persons 

 who bet on these races there will be on the 

 ground not less, all told, than five hundred 

 bookmakers, and assuming that only £20 are 

 drawn by each of them over every race, that 

 would represent a total amount of ^300,000 

 risked on the thirty races run during the four 

 days. An exponent of racing finance said 

 some years ago, in an article contributed to The 

 Edinburgh Revieio : " Taking it for granted 

 that ^1,500 only is risked by bettors on each 

 of the small races run during the season, and that 

 there are say 2,600 such contests, the total will 

 amount to nearly four millions sterling ! To 

 that sum must be added the money risked on the 

 larger races. On the popular betting handicaps, 

 such as that run at Lincoln, the City and 

 Suburban, the Royal Hunt Cup, the Northum- 

 berland Plate, and several other important racing 

 events, not forgetting the two great Newmarket 

 handicaps of October, quite a million sterling 

 will be represented." 



