150 'OLD Q 



Thus, in 1776, lie arranged forty-one engagements, of 

 which he won twenty-two — a magniticent result from 

 a racing point of view. Nor were the stakes meagre 

 for those days, as they brought nearly four thousand 

 pounds to his lordship's coffers. 



In July 1777, Lord March was bereft of his witty 

 but eccentric relative, Catharine, Duchess of Queens- 

 berry, who died from a surfeit of cherries, aged nearly 

 eighty. This event Walpole compares to the death 

 of the old Countess of Desmond, who died from the 

 effects of a fall from a walnut-tree at 140 ! Both 

 ladies were remarkable for the retentioti of their 

 beauty to an advanced age. 



It is during this year that reference is first found to 

 a jockey, one Dick Goodison, or, in the Newmarket 

 parlance of those times, ' Hellfire Dick ' — a sobriquet 

 earned by his ' flash of lightning ' finishes. How Lord 

 March and the Yorkshire ^ jockey became acquainted 

 I have been unable to discover. The Earl soon found 

 he had met one whom he could and did all but 

 implicitly trust for the remainder of his racing career ; 

 though the real connection between them, as master 

 and servant, afterwards became debatable matter. 

 Nevertheless, Goodison served March weU, and, though 

 many of his professional brethren had a better seat, 



^ He came from Selby. 



