CHAPTER XI 



THE HUMOURS OF TOMMY COLEMAN 



No record of steeplechasing would be complete without 

 some mention of the genuine but eccentric sportsman 

 "Tommy" Coleman, Boniface of the Chequers Inn, 

 St Albans, who did more for the sport than any man of 

 his time. There are countless tales told of Tommy, a few 

 of which I propose retailing here. 



No one whose memory goes back to the black December 

 of 1 87 1 is ever likely to forget that time of terrible sus- 

 pense, when the then Prince of Wales, our present King, lay 

 hovering between life and death. In connection with His 

 Royal Highness's illness. Tommy Coleman used to tell the 

 following story, and triumphantly adduced it as a proof 

 that the Prince's recovery was mainly, if not entirely, due 

 to the adoption of his (Coleman's) suggestion. Here is the 

 yarn in Tommy's own words : — 



"You mind that sad time when the Prince was so ill, 

 and not expected to live, and the papers every day gave 

 little or no hope of his recovery. I remember the time 

 when a son of mine, about twenty-eight years old, was 

 attacked with a severe fever, and laid up for some time, 

 attended by the family doctor, and at last we had a 

 physician. They both gave him up, and said it was no use 

 attempting anything more. I said, * Pooh, I'll give him 

 some good sherry ' ; and I gave him half a tumblerful, which 

 revived him at once, and we continued to give him sherry 

 and home-brewed beer, with Scotch oatmeal gruel. He 

 rallied and got well, and is alive now and over fifty years 

 old. In such cases, where people have been living well 

 and their whole system is full of animal food and tainted 

 with fever, by giving them beef-tea and soups you feed it. 



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