234 A MIRROR OF THE TURF. 



and also as an owner of horses on his own 

 account. It was chiefly in his early Manchester 

 days that he came "through the hard," as he 

 designated his then condition, and felt the lack 

 of money so much ; like many other turf adven- 

 turers in their beginning, he was poor one day 

 and rich another; "just as luck fell, lad." On 

 one occasion he became bankrupt over a cock-fight 

 at Liverpool — so impoverishecl, in fact, as to be 

 left without a coin to pay for either supper or 

 bed, and with the certainty that no breakfast 

 would await him in the morning ; but next day 

 he was rolling in what, in the circumstances, may 

 be called riches. Having previously backed a 

 horse to win him a hundred pounds — the animal 

 was Charles XII., which, in winning the Liverpool 

 Cup, won for Swindell the amount named — he 

 enjoyed his first taste of fortune in what he then 

 "thowt big money." A different fate befell him 

 on one occasion at Newcastle-on Tyne while 

 looking on the race for the Northumberland 

 Plate. For that race he had made two wrong 

 moves which told heavily against his pocket ; he 

 laid to lose a good "bit of brass" over the horse 

 that won, thinking it a " stiff one," and also 

 backed one that, as it appeared in the sequel, 

 had no pretensions to win ; " and lads," he used 

 to say, in telling the story, " a fellow that was on 

 the winning nag and were standing at my back, 

 smashed in my hat. Oh, it were cruel, but that 

 chap had backed the winner." 



-In time, after experiencing many of the 

 bitters, and also a few of the sweets that are 

 incidental to the " great game," Swindell resolved 

 to make London his place of residence ; and 



