l A SPRAT TO CATCH A MACKEREL: 15 



being the value of the stakes. Fortunately Mr. Padwick 

 backed him for the Cup, and thus had a little salve to 

 his hasty indiscretion in parting with him. 



I have referred to the mistake he made with 

 Alvediston. In connection with his purchase of this 

 animal from me, at the time being known as The 

 Crossfire Colt, Mr. Padwick's subsequent attitude was 

 characteristic if original. In the autumn of 18 GO he 

 came with Lord Westmoreland to buy two horses — 

 Schism and The Crossfire Colt. His lordship took 

 the former for £1,500, and Mr. Padwick the colt for 

 £600, with the proviso that £400 more should be 

 paid on his winning £1,000 — a sum duly paid over 

 the New Stakes at Ascot. Schism's performances 

 were well known, and from them his lordship could 

 judge of her value, and in taking her at the sum as 

 usual committed no error in judgment; for he recouped 

 himself the outlay, and a considerable sum besides, in 

 winning the Handicap in the Second October Meeting 

 over the Cesarewitch course no great time after. But 

 with The Crossfire Colt or Alvediston it was a very 

 different thing. Here Mr. Padwick took my word, 

 and believed him to be what I thought and said he 

 was ; and he was not disappointed. For after winning, 

 as before related, the New Stakes at Ascot and a 

 Stake at Stockbridge, he refused £6,500 — a sum I 

 strongly recommended him to take, as I thought the 

 horse was too furnished and small, to improve much 

 with ag;e. Mr. Padwick, however, would not take 



