136 



they got up, and if this was not done habitually things were made 

 unpleasant for the amateur during the running. Poor Captain Shaw 

 found this to his cost in many a race, till finally and fatally he found 

 it at Youghal. 



I think it was Captain Tempest who I saw give Dan Meaney £10 for 

 the mount on Blind Harper, at Cashel, for the Rock Stakes, and, as 

 well as I can remember, the plucky and popular officer won. He, and 

 perhaps three or four more, were the only soldiers who could ride a 

 steeplechase at the time I refer to. 



Notwithstanding the stiff fences which were in every Irish steeple- 

 chase course twenty or thirty years ago, I maintain, no doubt against 

 the better opinion of many others, that the pace was as good then as it 

 is now. Anyway, the horses went as hard as they could lay legs to 

 ground, being, of course, steadied to a certain extent at the formidable 

 fortifications they had to face ; and as the horses of olden time were as 

 good as, if not a vast deal better than those of to-day, what I say cannot 

 be far wrong. 



Now, let us contrast the state of former steeplechase affairs, as I have 

 endeavoured to describe them, with what they are at present. 



Our stand-houses are excellently constructed, fitted with every con- 

 venience, and many are luxuriously so. Well-constructed palings keep 

 the run-home as clear as at Epsom for the Derby; nicely trimmed, pretty 

 little hedgerows made of privet, furze, or laurel, so as not to hurt the 

 horses' legs if they gallop through instead of over them, are the fences 

 we often see, and galloping throvrjh is invited by the method of planting. 

 These are in some courses diversified by diminutive mounds of clay, with 

 a narrow shallow dry ditch on the landing side, so that horses may clear 

 them from field to field without increasing the length of their galloping 

 stride, or rising more than a foot and a half. To be sure, we have the 

 conventional "gallery " jump in front of the grand stand in the shape of 

 a brook so graphically described by Bromley-Davenport as a 



Shallow-dug pan, with a hurdle to screen it, 

 That cock-tail imposture, the steeplechase brook ! 



Gentlemen jockeys come now, in some instances attended by valets, 

 bringing portmanteaus stuffed with as many changes of clothes as would 

 suffice a man for a tour. They dress in comfortable rooms, and come 

 forth adorned for the fray, smart as the Newmarket professionals. 



Our stand-houses and enclosures cover twenty times more ground 

 than the old ones, and they are not one whit too big for the multitudes 

 at 10s. to 15s. a head. We have scores of betting men at every meeting, 

 and they have hundreds to bet with them ; but we have neither roulette 

 nor hazard — at least, not to be seen. 



Within the enclosures we have crowds of all classes, from the appren 

 tice and junior clerk to the principals of every business under the sun. 

 These, together with the gentry, nearly all bet upon every race, and a 

 great many of them heavily. Ladies come in numbers little short of the 



