170 JOCKEYS. 
instructions, and possibly to the ruin of his employer. Such 
a case happened at Shrewsbury in 1871, and produced some 
spirited letter-writing : Admiral Rous taking one, and in my 
opinion, the wrong side; whilst Mr. Chaplin, with his usual 
acumen, ably advocated the right. 
I will now name one or two other cases ; not, be it under- 
stood, that they are the only ones I could put my hand upon, 
but because they will suffice to show that the instances are in 
themselves too frequent, and something of the immense injury 
that such occurrences may produce. The first I remember 
seeing was with Mr. Rolt’s two horses, Collingwood and The 
Cur, at Goodwood in 1847. He declared to win with Colling- 
wood, but George Whitehouse beat him on, The Cur by a 
length, and nothing else near. The incident caused, as one 
might expect, a great deal of excitement and much angry 
feeling at the time, and led to an investigation on the subject. 
The jockey’s explanation, that he mistook the colours of the 
rider of Collingwood, was accepted, and so the matter ended. 
Mr. Rolt lost large sums by the result, and to this may be 
attributed his retirement from the turf, which took place soon 
after. Mr. J. B. Starkey had a similar case happen to him with 
Viridis and Land Tax. The latter was backed for many and 
heavy sums, whilst no one had backed the other for a guinea. 
The owner made the usual declaration to win with Land Tax, 
who beat all the rest in the field but his stable companion, the 
latter winning easily. This fatal action of the jockey’s not only 
caused Mr. Starkey’s secession from the turf, but, it is to be 
feared, brought about the ruin of an honourable and estimable 
man ; for he went abroad, where he died a few years after. 
In contrast to such fatal performances, it must have been 
truly gratifying to his Grace the Duke of Hamilton to win as 
he did, his orders being obeyed to the very letter in the hands 
