THE TURF CAREER OF THE MARQUIS OF HASTINGS.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 237, 15 February 1869, Page 3

THE TURF CAREER OF THE MARQUIS OF HASTINGS.

{From the Daily News.) " The Earl's year" has reached a sad climax in the death of its-leading actor. The Spider and the Fly drama is ended. That poor coronetted youth who had crowded into s : x j years more Corinthian excitement, and weightier turf cares than many " fast men. know in a lifetime, has laid down his weary load. _ He was only 26 in July, and he had frittered away two flne family estates. Betting is said to be the touchstone of theEnglishr man's sincerity, but with the marquis, a craving for the udds had really become a disease. He worshipped chance with -■'all -the ardour of a fanatic. His wits were, he considered, worth to him nj.-.the betting-ringiat least £20,600 a year, and he sometimes threaded his way through the mazes of trials and public running with all the sagacity Of a wizard. His' 'public coups were often so brilliant that it washardly to be wondered at that he believed in his own destiny,' and ;hte. power to break the ring. ; He cared littte whether the draining or other improy'ementiß on his Donnington estate-were stopped, if he only got fresh supplies for -another Newm.aijket campaign. The ring, on the other hand, had marked him for their own, and xieyer left h|m. 'They would- cluster beneath the Jockey Club; balcony at- Epsom j holding up; /thei* hands to claim his attention, and catching ajt hfs replies like a flock- of hungry fiawks. There he would stand smiling at the wil<J tumult below, wearing his hat jauntily. ob one side, a red flower in his button-hole, anil hj.B colours round his neck, and cbol anji calm while " the talent "• made' his horse a "hot favourite " at once, and a few slipped back to the ring to follow his lead. Fora time he was a perfect Cocker; but he fell at last in the unequal strife, and the men who had " drawn " him most copiously were among those who set their faces most sternly against him when he wished to see the Heath once moreThe marquis's taste for the turf was not an hereditary one.- His father's heart was with hound and horn. • He loved to halloo '■' the red rascal" over the rides far better than watching the Leger horses close up round the Red-house turn. The men of the Midlands still speak of him as quite a representative sportsman with Will Goodall and the " Sir Harry," whom they lost so early. He would hardly have stepped aside to see a race; but a scarcity of foxes in Charnwood Forest, or finding himself above 12 stone on the scales, would have sorely yexed his soul. His son cared for none of these things." Still he could not bear to see the Quorn without a master, and he stepped boldly into the breach when Mr Clowes resigned in '66. He wore the horn at his saddle bow for conformity's sake, but he never blew it, and he let the field go its own way, and hunted the country on no system. A bit of a gallop, a check, and then trotting off to sift a favourite gorse for a fresh fox, jumped much more with his humour than an old-fashioned hunting run, where hounds had to puzzle it out. Often, when his hounds had reached the meet, 10 or 12 miles away, he was hardly out of bed, and he would turn up "on wheels," and occasionally from London by special train, and give Wilson the word to draw, when half the field had gone home. No wonder that caricatures were drawn, and squibs flew gaily about, and that even Leicestershire aaid it would rather be bled in the purse- vein tban have the country hunted gratis in such a fashion. Satirical verses failed to soar him. He took the sting out of their tail by reprinting them at his own private, press, and posted them far and wide. On the last day of his mastership, he slipped quietly away to the station, |and when they looked for him to give him a parting cheer he had heen well nigh gone an hour. . The honour of being " the man who belongs to" The Duke, or The Earl, or Little Lecturer, was no burden to him. He took quite naturally to the turf from the -first, enfolded under the wing of Danebury, jln 1862 not six people at Newmarket knew who the slim lad was on the grey cob ; but the ring soon saw that he was a veritable Hamp :

I shire "ambassador when he put down " the money ,< so unflinchingly on ajDanqbury pot. [ToiJohn t.iy's suggestion t^aj; jh|hjS.j*-iosition he was morally bound to have a nice yearling or two of his own, he lent no ungracious ear. When the rivalry round the.Hamptoncourt and Middle-park rings almost foamed into madness, and 2500 guineas and 2000 guineas were among the yearling prices of one afternoon, he was never tempted beyond 1650 guineas for King Charles, and 1500 guineas for Robespierre. The former would have been dear at 50. guineas, and the latter won well in the colours of another. His two best horses, The Duke (500 gs.) and The Earl (450 gs.) were among his cheapest purchases. The late Alfred Day first won his colours on Garotter in the Althorp-park Stakes at Northampton, and Sana Rogers won a maiden plate on that colt a few weeks afterwards. The first great victory for the ".red and white, hoops" was the Cambridgeshire of 1864, with Ackworth, which had been esteemed a dear £2000 purchase. Gradually his stable swelled' to upwards of 30, and about -£70,000 -vfere the spoils of six seasons. Catalogue was a great pet of his lordship's, and he did not care how much he backed her for in a selling sweepstakes, ahd how dearly he redeemed her. 'A* cycle of barrenness followed one of profusion, and Mr Padwick graciously allowed him, in 1865, to have Kangaroo at.it was 5aid, ,£12,00.0, and he never won as many halfpence, while The Duke was useless^ from influenza,' till half the season was over. In 1866, which produced him a One Thousand Guinea winner in Repulse, and a Goodwood Cup one in The Duke, the stable was once more at a dead lock for a Cesarewitch horse, but Little Lecturer, a foal from .the Sledmere sale, carried 7st 3lb, and won, it was said, £40,000 for the Donnington party. ,;._•* A .winter's .reflection convinced his .lordship that Hermit could never win the Derby, and £100,000 was the price he paid for his thoughts. People were once wont to tell, almost below their breath, that "Davis, the Leviathan," had been known to pay away £600,00.. on the Derby. : The present age is capable of greater efforts, as before the Monday the bankers and solicitors had consulted, and the whole of the marquis's losings were found for him. Thus panic was averted from ''The Corner," butthe fair' lands of. Lbdoun passed from his hand. At Ascot his lucky star rose once more. Lady' Elizabeth and Lecturer were both in form, and his lordship kept backing them, and piling on the winnings again by a sort of ■ geometric i progression, gambling till he had won nearly haif " his am again." It was. now the turn for reverses. His lordship rather fancied The Earl, but the stable Overruled him in favour of Lady Elizabeth/ The flying filly came back with, a sadly .chequered, fame a bad fifth for the Middle Park Plate, and yet- the- victress in one, of the most .wonderful of moderi) matches at 9ib with the 'three-year-old ,Ju|iUß. ;. ;; •. ' „,t;■y; ;j r.f ' The marquis had now fallen hick ag^h, to nearly .the sauie "agouyj point <"'-. m , 4 n ?MPf a ? when he saw the " all ; rbse" handed. Tiome for the Derby. A weary 'winter followed, and h$ was so, driven, from; pillari tp<poafe hy money troubles and turf creditors that he lost his interest in turf matters <and , hißhead' , f ©^calculations with it. The irritable Lady Elizabeth wasted to a shadow inier tr aining ; and how The Earl was scratched, and then became the hero of the Parisiabs and the Ascot visitors, and. now f t|^e,,.(e.«r . w,rds ,fl*^t were dropped at Torlc pro ve^ the precursor of his Leger doom, are all dark passages of turf politics, and not easily' forgotten. We saw the last of The Earl when he was bought in as stout asa burgomaster for. 3900 guineas at Tattersall's, and then he, departed to Findon with a leg, upon whose chances of standing a preparation each man seemed to differ with his fellow. The late marquis had been abroad all the summer in his yacht, but no northern breeze could fan him back to health. He came to poncaster, from Norway, on crutches, and looking very ill and nervous, and well he might, as, instead of having a St Leger winner, he had only the lean comfort of a .vet.eri mary certificate from Mr Mayor. At the ! First October he was on Newmarket-heath in a basket carriage, which he only quitted to say a word to the pretty Athena, " which once was mare of mine," when she was led back a winner. As at Doncaster, he did not go beyond " a pony" or two. "Mind, I'm to have this paid." said one ring man when he booked it to him, and after that week they Baw : him no more. Nearly seven seasons had passed by since he. first came a lad of 19 fresh from Eton to Newmarket, and he left it a shattered man, only to die. He spent some time at Folkestone, and visited town tfbr a few days before he set out for a winter sojourn with his wife on the Nile. Some few. friends dared to hope that he might come back a new man and live quietly in his old country home, and train the foals by The Duke. .;, It was not to be. "All the wheels were down," and now the fourth and the laet Marquis of Hasting only lives in race-course story. •;