1 2 2 TJie Post and the Paddock, 



that he hardly cared to join the party at the Club- 

 rooms in the evening. However, he found his way 

 there, for the first time after a long interval, during 

 the Craven Meeting of that year, and after matching 

 Memnon against Enamel, with Lord Exeter, knocked 

 up Will Chifney, about twelve at night, to learn his 

 opinion of this looo guineas A. F. venture. . Four 

 thousand guineas had been refused for Memnon 

 before the St. Leger ; and the Chifneys generally 

 believed that his lordship gave something like 3000 

 guineas for him. He was a long, loose, big, and 

 leggy horse, and supposed to be game — a point on 

 which the brothers Chifney always considered that 

 Bill Scott had overrated him. He had, nevertheless, 

 run remarkably well in the hands of the latter, as he 

 defeated The Alderman, after a desperate punishing 

 race, in the Champagne ; carried off the York Spring 

 Leger cleverly ; and came in three lengths ahead of 

 thirty, the largest field that ever showed at the St. 

 Leger post. The tumble of Fleur-de-lis, and the 

 consequent disappointment of The Alderman, con- 

 tributed greatly to this last result ; but the elegant 

 Actaeon, who was third, defeated him in the following 

 August, for a Subscription Purse, over Knavesmire, 

 in one of the very finest finishes ever ridden there. 

 The race was over the Old Tw^o-mile Course ; but it 

 was only run in earnest three-quarters of a mile, which 

 suited Harry Edwards, who knew that his horse could 

 go the fastest, to a nicety, and enabled him to defeat 

 Sam's terrific rush by a bare head, when he brought 

 Memnon, with a stroke of the whalebone, which might 

 have been heard to Bishopthorpe, in the last three 

 strides from the chair. " By Jove, Sam's nailed 

 Jam r was the ecstatic expression of Will at this 

 moment, as he fairly sprang into the air, from the 

 form outside the weighing-house, nearly upsetting 

 the present Tommy Shepherd and a group of York- 

 shire jocks in his descent. Lord Darlington was so 



