BRITISH SPORT PAST AND PRESENT 



his grey filly by Crab against Mr. Valentine Knightley's 

 Marplot over the Beacon Course for £50 a side ; but they, or 

 the stewards, had omitted to appoint a judge, and unfortun- 

 ately they made so close a race of it that they could not decide 

 between themselves who had won. ' As it occasioned some 

 Disputes it was by Agreement left to Lord Godolphin, who 

 determined it to be a drawn Match.' An extraordinary case 

 occurred at the Farn (Cheshire) meeting of 1761, when Mr. 

 Egerton's Dionysius and the Hon. Harvey Ashton's Wildair 

 were entered for the Second Annual Prize of twenty-one 

 guineas.^ Says the Calendar: ' Dionysius started alone between 

 12 and 3. Wildair started alone between 3 and 5. A dispute 

 arose which was entitled to the Plate, and was not settled when 

 this went to Press.' We must suppose that a time was 

 appointed for starting that race ; but if this trifling formality 

 had been overlooked, the point was indeed a knotty one for the 

 authorities to determine, supposing them to regard the per- 

 formance as a race at all. 



The hard case presented to the judge by an accident at the 

 Oxford meeting of 1731 probably arose from a too successful 

 jostle. Conqueror and John Trot fell together so near the 

 ' ending post ' that the judge could not determine whether 

 either horse had carried his rider past the post. The method 

 adopted to decide the point was curious : ' a person making an 

 affidavit that before John Trot fell his weight at least had 

 passed the post,' his evidence was accepted and the race 

 awarded to that horse. The proceeding displays confidence in 

 the disinterestedness of that person. 



One or two races sufficed for a day's sport when the event 

 was decided in heats of two, three, or four miles with half an 

 hour ' for rubbing ' between. Three heats usually revealed 

 the winner, but when fields were large, more were often re- 

 quired. At the Beverley meeting held in May 1751, nine 

 five-year-olds started for a £50 purse, three-mile heats : each 



' An endowed race : and therefore exempted from operation of the Act which pre- 

 scribed a £50 minimum stake. 



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