Sporting and Dramatic REVIEW . . AND . . LICENSED VICTUALLERS’ GAZETTE. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Thursday, October 20, 1898 THE NEW ZEALAND CUP.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume IX, Issue 430, 20 October 1898, Page 10

Sporting and Dramatic REVIEW . . AND . . LICENSED VICTUALLERS’ GAZETTE. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE WEEKLY STANDARD. Thursday, October 20, 1898 THE NEW ZEALAND CUP.

As the time approaches for the decision of the New Zealand Cup the interest of the public in the great handicap event of the year increases, but as recorders of fact we are bound to acknowledge that the interest in the contest this year is not so great as in the days gone by. The fact is that the interest in the annual event is on the wane, and perhaps the conservative policy of the Canterbury Jockey Club has a great deal to do with that. We do not for one moment wish it to be understood that we entertain one unfriendly feeling towards the totaiisator, because, on the contrary, we feel that the machine is one of the fairest means afforded to the public of speculating on the day of the race, but it is not post betting that engenders the wide-spread interest in the race, and we venture to think that if the will of the Canterbury Club in the suppression of bookmakers was carried out there would be a much greater abatement of public interest in the New Zealand Cup than has of late been noticeable. It cannot be denied that the fact that books having been open for months has been the means of encouraging owners by ennabling them to get long prices about horses, and in this matter they have a right to a slight advantage over the general public, who are not directly taxed with the oat bill, or training and jockeys’ fees, to say nothing of the heavy expense, and frequently danger, entailed by owners travelling their horses from Auckland in the north, or Dunedin in the south, to the Riccarton convincing ground. We entertain but little doubt that it is the facilities offered for obtaining the long odds that has encouraged many owners and trainers to persevere with their charges, and accounts for the presence of many of the horses in the list of twenty which remained in the Cup after the payment last week. The doubts existing as to the intentions of the Yaldhurst stable caused the publication of the acceptances to be awaited with more curiosity than usual, and when Multiform’s name appeared in the list, while the well-backed St. Cyr was an absentee, it became very apparent that the brilliant son of Hotchkiss will be a starter for the New Zealand Cup, notwithstanding the statement that he was an unlikely starter, attributed to Mr Stead by the Christchurch Weekly Press soon after the weights came out. While on this subject we feel compelled to remark that the open letter written by ‘‘Petronel” in the columns of the Sporting Review have been misconstrued in certain quarters, and that, too, in a spirit that implies deliberate perversion of fact. There seems to be a desire on the part of some people to insinuate that it was the wish of the Sporting Review to force the owners of horses to declare their intentions, but that insinuation is unjust and absurd. An owner has every right to keep his own counsel, but if he expresses an intention to scratch and does not do so, then the misleading statement is open to criticism. Terlinga ” is a public writer for whom we have had respect, and probably the lot of good Mr Stead has done in paying liberal prices for thoroughbreds is recognised by him, while he

also may have grateful recollections of his pleasant visit to Yaldhurst, but that does not justify him in writing the following, which we feel sure our readers will agree is not within the strict bounds of fact, and is scarcely what we should expect from the pen of a conscientious public scribe :— A few weeks since an . Auckland paper published an open letter of a not very flattering character to Mr G. G. Stead, the acting chairman of the Canterbury Jockey Club. The cause of Mr Stead’s offending seems to have been, firstly, keeping Multiform in the New Zealand Cup until he makes up his mind as to whether or not he will run him.

The spirit of “ Petronel’s ” criticism, we repeat, was directed against .the misleading statement that Multiform was an unlikely starter in the New Zealand Cup, and not to the keeping of Multiform in the New Zealand Cup. Further on, however, the writer displays his bias by stating:— The real grievance 'with the Auckland paper may be that Mr Stead is the principal director of the Weekly Press, and this paper has been telling the Multiform story from week to week.

The insinuation is untruthful, as well as un journalistic.