200 THE ENGLISH TURF 



half during the year, and a two-mile Queen's Plate at the 

 November Meeting. 



The Leicester Course is situated about three miles from the 

 Leicester Railway Station, and close to the village of Oadby. 

 The meetings have had various ups and downs, and at one 

 time monster prizes were offered, both for weight-for-age 

 races and handicaps. Somehow or other they did not bring 

 about much success, and now the bulk of the racing is of 

 the plating order. At the same time the plating is securing 

 that success which the monster prizes missed, and at no 

 meetings in the kingdom are more entries procured or are 

 large fields a greater certainty. The truth of the matter 

 probably is that in the days of the big prizes the attendances 

 were not large enough to return much to the executive in 

 the way of gate money, and now that less ambitious pro- 

 grammes are issued a smaller gate will answer the purpose. 



That a very large attendance should not be customary at 

 a place like Leicester is somewhat difficult to understand, 

 until it is explained that a strong anti-racing section exists 

 in the town ; and the surrounding country is not populous 

 enough to produce a large crowd. It is very curious how 

 the large English towns vary in this respect. At Notting- 

 ham, for instance, they are nearly all sportsmen, but at 

 Leicester, only a few miles away, the reverse is the case, 

 and about nine-tenths of the visitors to the races arrive 

 by train every day. Leicester, it is thought, is also ac- 

 tuated by a feeling of resentment at the conversion of the 

 meeting from an open to a closed one. In the open days 

 the workpeople took a half-holiday with the consent of 

 their employers. The Leicester Course is in many ways a 

 singularly attractive one. I know as I write this that I 

 shall be taken to task for the utterance ; nevertheless I 

 feel strongly that the give and take at Oadby is very 

 welcome after the never-ending dead -flats of so many 

 modern enclosures. Nor do I think it right that horses 

 should have so many of these flat courses to race upon. A 

 well-made thoroughbred, with well-placed shoulders and good 

 hocks, goes just as easily up and down hill as he does on the 

 flat, and at Leicester there are plenty of gradients, the 



