VETERAN A R Y JURIS P RU D EN C E . 
463 
“to the editor of the times. 
“Sir, — I am directed by the stewards of the Jockey Club to request that 
you will insert the annexed letter to Mr. Thornton, in the earliest number of 
vour paper. 
“ I am, Sir, 
“ Your obedient Servant, 
“ 7 , Oxendon Street, February 25, 1842. “ C. Weatherby.” 
“TO RICHARD THORNTON, ESQ. 
“ Sir, — As you failed to appear when summoned on the 9th inst., and have 
not paid the sum of £100, which you owe to Mr. Gurney on his Epsom ac- 
count, I am directed by the stewards of the Jockey Club to give y° u notice, 
under the 41st rule of the club, that you will not be permitted to come into 
the Coffee-room yard at Newmarket, nor upon the race-course there, until 
the bets due from you to Mr. Gurney in respect of which you have been de- 
clared a defaulter, shall be certified to have been discharged ; and that if you 
disregard this notice, it will be enforced against you by legal process. I am 
directed to add, that information of this notice having been served upon you 
has been sent to Messrs. Tattersall. The stewards, at the same time, ex- 
pressly desire to have it understood, that they do not take into their con- 
sideration any contract or agreement involving legal liabilities between you 
and any other parties, nor any of the consequences thereof; still less do they 
presume to impugn any decision of a court of law thereupon. It is suffi- 
cient for them that you have made bets upon a race, and that, having lost 
those bets, you refuse to pay them ; and when it has been decided by the 
Jockey Club that you are bound to pay what you have lost, you set that decision 
at defiance. You are, therefore, according to the practices of the turf, a de- 
faulter, and as such, the stewards deem it their duty, not only in vindication 
of their authority, but as an example as well as a protection toothers, to ex- 
clude you from all places in the occupation or under the jurisdiction of the 
Jockey Club. 
“ I am. Sir, your very obedient servant, 
“ C. Weatherby.” 
“ 7 , Oxendon-street, February 25, 1842.” 
With respect to this letter he would ask, if the defendants meant to have 
acted bona fide. If they thought that they had the power to declare Mr. 
Thornton a defaulter, and therefore to exclude him from those places over 
which their power and influence extended, why did they not write to the 
Duke of Portland, their tenant, at Newmarket, or to Mr. Tattersall, for that 
purpose ? Instead of doing so, they directed their secretary, Mr. Weatherby, 
to publish letters on the subject in The Times, the Morning Herald, and 
other papers, to be circulated through the world. There could be no other 
object for such procedure than that of doing the plaintiff an injury. It was 
done in a vindictive spirit, because Mr. Thornton had come into that court 
and obtained the verdict of a jury, in opposition to the decision of the Jockey 
Club ; and because he had done this — because he had appealed from their 
decision — because he had sought and obtained the verdict of a jury, 
they had thought proper to publish letters stating that he was a defaulter, 
that he had not paid his debts, and was therefore excluded from the 
precincts of the Jockey Club. He would call the attention of the jury 
to the defence set up. In their first plea the defendants stated, that when 
any question arose touching any bets on horse-races the Jockey Club was 
the proper tribunal to appeal to in such cases, and that their decision was 
