302 A MIRROR OF THE TURF. 



the Marquis won the Middle Park Plate, Lady 

 Elizabeth's total winnings as a two-year-old would 

 have amounted to a sum of over ^14,000. 



No sooner had the struggle for the Blue 

 Ribbon of 1868 been decided — in which Lady 

 Elizabeth was nearer last than first, although 

 she started the undoubted favourite for the 

 event with odds of 7 to 4 betted against her 

 chance — than persons began to shake their heads 

 and give utterance to the usual stereotyped re- 

 marks germane to such occasions, as, "I told you 

 so," " A rank stiff one," " What a scandal," and so 

 forth. 



In plain language, it was assumed by a large 

 section of the public that Lady Elizabeth had 

 never been intended to win the Derby, but that, 

 on the contrary, the mare had been for months an 

 abject "market horse," and that thousands of 

 pounds had been invested on the animal for 

 the benefit of the Marquis and his aiders and 

 abettors in the fraud ; that all connected with 

 Lady Elizabeth, from her owner down to the boy 

 who every morning removed the litter from her 

 stall, had made fortunes by means of the milking 

 pail which had been in such constant requisition ! 

 Moreover it was currently stated among numerous 

 reports circulated that Admiral Rous had asserted 

 that the mare, just previous to the race, had been 

 heavily drugged with laudanum ; but the Admiral, 

 in a letter to The Times newspaper under the 

 date of June 15th, 1868, gave an emphatic con- 

 tradiction to that report. In continuation, the 

 Admiral went on to say : " My belief is that Lady 

 Elizabeth had a rough spin with Athena in 

 March, when the Days discovered she had lost 



