The Horse Was to be Made Safe.

Otago Witness, Issue 1915, 3 August 1888, Page 25

The Horse Was to be Made Safe.

they should make me safe first." The v^lage of Ashstead, at which Tom Dawson stayed, was well provided with accoraodation in prerailway days, having- the Leg of Mntton and Cauliflower at one end of its solitary street, and the Haunch of Venison at the other. It •was at Leatherhead, however, that John Scott's powerful stable found entertainment for man and beast ; and where John Scott was concerned it was as necessary to supply him and hi* brother Bill with what they called " good grab " as their horses with Scotch oats and three-year-old hay. The two famous brothers were in the habit of coming to Leatherhead some weeks before: the Derby, just as they went with fcheir horses to Pigturn many weeks before the Doncaster St. Leger. They pub up at the Swan Inn, in Leatherhead, whore- some misty recollections of the days when Mnndig. and

Cotherstone won the Derby, and Cyprian, Industry, and the Princess ran away with the Oaks, still linger in the minds of old inhabitants. It was from the Swan that Bill Scott and his Jldus AcJiates, Jack Eobson, set forth, on the night following the Derby of 1844, to dig up the body of Leander, whose leg had been broken in the race by his brother sinner the foar-year-old Banning Rein, and who was buried close to the rails at Tattenham Corner. It was Bill Scott's intention to cut off Leander's head, and to subject his mouth to critical examination ; but when they had dug down to the carcass, lo and behold ! the lower jaw had been sawn off and carried away. The village of Banstead is historically interesting as the resting place at which for many years John Day's horses were stabled. From Banstead Crucifix won the Oaks in 1840 and Mendicant in 1846 ; and from Banstead came Pyrrhus the First and Cossack to win the Derby in 1848 and 1847. Bat it is round Sherwood's stables, visible on the other side of the course from the grand stand, that the choicest memories of England's greatest race cluster. Fifty years ago the betting ring was on the brow of the hill above Tattenham Corner, and it was extremely difficult for the owner of a horse to find his equine champion, so as to receive the derviers muts of his trainer before repairing to the betting ring to take his final plunge. This difficulty was experienced by Lord George Bentinck in 1836, when he was convinced that Lord Jersey's