TOUTS AND TIPSTERS. 133 



selections minus their reasons for giving them, they 

 might, perhaps, be thought sensible writers, even 

 when their prophecies come to grief. Imagine a 

 tipster who would not entertain the chance of Robert 

 the Devil for the St. Leger because in his opinion ' the 

 horse could not stay '! Could not stay, and yet that 

 horse was only beaten for the Derby by Bend Or b}^, 

 perhaps, ten inches, and afterwards won the Grand 

 Prize of Paris over a greater distance than the St. 

 Leger is run over ! A tipster fortunate enough 

 to select Buchanan for the Lincoln Handicap led 

 his followers an expensive dance by continually 

 selecting throughout the 3'car horses from the same 

 stable to win the important races of the season. 

 That tipster, at the close of flat racing, was ' nowhere ' 

 among his fellows. Many turf writers imagine that, 

 because a stable begins well, its good fortune is sure 

 to continue throughout the season ; but it is an idea 

 which very often brings those who believe in it to a 

 condition of financial grief. It is scarcely worth while 

 to occupy space with the failures of tipsters, they are 

 so numerous, but a few samples ma}^ be given. A pro- 

 fessional tipster wrote as follows of the Kempton Park 

 November Handicap of 27th November, 18S0 : 'As to 

 the bottom-weights, the Irish-bred animals Whist and 

 Beauchamp II. [the Avinner !], they cannot go fast 

 enough to keep themselves warm.' These remarks 

 actually appeared in a paper having on its staff two 

 sporting writers, which was issued on the morning of 

 the race, and in which the scribe wrote of a horse 

 which had been ' scr.itched ' some days previously as 

 if it were still in the race. Some years since thero 



