i62 Indian Racing Reminiscences. 



couple of years, make his house my home, and use his 

 horses to race or ride just as I Hked. I would have 

 accepted his offer, as I knew it was meant, but I was 

 broken down with intermittent fever, and had to say 

 good-bye, with a very heavy heart, to the warmest- 

 hearted friend and bravest sportsman I have ever met. 



Second to none for hospitality and fondness for sport 

 is Mr. H. }i. Abbott, who manages the large " concern " 

 of Jaintpore, which is about sixteen miles distant from 

 Mozufferpore. Of the many real sportsmen I have met 

 among Indian racing men — who, take them "all round," 

 are an uncommonly " good sort " — Mr. Abbott is the only 

 one who persistently studies his friends' interests rather 

 than his own. His stable is always filled with other 

 people's horses, which he keeps for the ridiculous sum 

 of about a guinea a month, trains and races them 

 generally with great success, though without pecuniary 

 profit to himself, simply out of sheer love of sport and 

 desire to do a good turn to his friends, among whom he 

 counts every visitor to Tirhoot. The first time I met 

 him was at the lotteries of a Mozufferpore meeting. 

 " To set the ball rolling," I tossed for some tickets, lost 

 them, and wound up by buying what I might have 

 known was a certain loser. When the gambling was 



