HAWKES BAY.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume IX, Issue 447, 16 February 1899, Page 13

HAWKES BAY.

Mr W. C. Edwards as a starter— Items of interest concerning the Wairoa meeting—Return of Fred. Davis —Accident to Tireau—lncorrect telegrams—A steamer delayed —Cceur de Lion—Tigress—The The Wairoa totalisator—The Hissington Hack Club meeting. Napieb, February 14. The starting at the late Wairoa meeting was under the able dispensation of Mr W. C. Edwards, Cceur de Lion and Co.’s trainer. Owing to the steamer, which conveyed him from Napier, being some hours over her anticipated time, he was not able to get going for the first two items on the programme, and Mr Cooper kindly filled the gap. The able and meritorious manner in which Mr Edwards handled his fields was generally admired, and the stewards, to show how they appreciated his efforts, entertained the flag-wielder on the evening of the second day’s racing. Mr Mahanga Kamnata, the Hawke’s Bay owner, secured half-a-dozen races with his team at Wairoa—Jadoo, En Avant, and Hinepara each scoring upon a brace of occasions. Their victories placed him at the head of the winning owners’ list with £l6l as hie share of the booty. Fred. Davis, the Hon. J, D. Ormond’s leading horseman, is back again at his old quarters at Karam u. The Napier Park Racing Club are having one of Mr George Ellis’ starting machines erected on their property. The Park trainers will now be able to educate their strings to the automatic despatcher, and when they pay a visit to fixtures which favor the starting-gate their horses will not be handicapped by the strangeness of the surroundings, as has been their lot before.

Tirant d’Eau’s three-year old full brother, Tireau, met with bad luck last Wednesday morning on the Hastings grass gallop. While performing his tasks he, by some unaccountable means, broke his off fore leg at the fetlock. His mentor informed me this morning that it had not yet been decided what was going to be done with the gelding, whether the friendly bullet would be called in, or if means are to be taken to try and save him. Tireau has been showing excellently in his efforts, and a good future had been predicted for him by those intimately associated with him. Percy Martin, who trains him, has not had too much sunshine or fair wind for years past, and he is to be commiserated with on the loss of such a seemingly valuable servant.

Golden Plover’s name was wired through to the local papers here as the winner of the Second Hurdles at Wairoa, and, of course, his backers duly collected. However, when some of the resident sports arrived here by the overland route, the boat being delayed through the bar being blocked, they corrected the statement by giving the actual winner (En Avant), and now the punters who supported him are getting their bit, which undoubtedly gives the vendors of start-ing-price goods an awkward turn, as they now have to set to and collect the Golden Plover money they disbursed, which is not such an easy task as it looks. Possession is nine points of the law, you know.

Little Billee, who got severely kicked on the hocks by Daphne at. the start in the big race on the first day, was telegraphed t-> the papers, and according’y published by them as third placegetter in the Awatere Stakes, but he did not face the music in that event, which shows carelessness on the part of the person who was attending to the wants of the Press at the Wairoa end of the wire, or was the Telegraph Department, to blame for the muddle ? It certainly can be picked in two.

After five days delay the Te Kapu, with a number of horses and visitors to the Wairoa gathering, arrived yesterday afternoon. A number of sports and performers at the meeting decided not to wait for the chance of the boat leaving, and made their way by road (called so by courtesy). I have not visited Wairoa by that way, and, judging by what I heard from those who did so the other day, I never will. Fever in the feet—that old malady of Cceur de Lion’s—is again, so his educator fancies, making its appearance in Dreadnought’s son. If the surmise turns out correct, and the climate remains as hot and dry as it is just now, it is any odds that the starter will not have to handle the lionhearted named one during the Hawke’s Bay and Napier Park meetings next month. Tigress is again in active commission, but I imagine her rest has not been of long enough duration to do her as much good as she requires. Owing, no doubt, to the unfavorable weather —it was raining and blowing upon both days of the gathering —the Wairoa Club’s totalisator takings fell £491 short of the previous meeting in 1898. J. Griffiths, who is attached to Mr Mahanga Kaiwhata’s quarters, was the most successful jockey at the Wairoa races, four wins being credited to him. Last Saturday the Kissington Hack Club held its usual annual meeting. Those of a speculative turn of mind who attended the venture were well catered for, as fully a dozen bookies, who were charged a guinea each for permission to bet, were able and willing for business. No great amount of betting was, however, indulged in. Pierrot (a massive three-year-old of the Musket stallion Foulshot) and Barbette (a granddaughter of Traducer) were triumphant in the two principal races of the day, the Kissington Cup and Woodthorpe Handicap. Tire, who won the latter event last year, carried off the hurdle race. Te Tau, the full brother to the defunct Greenstone,

captured the Hurry Scurry; Nukurau’s brother, Kapongo, captured the Patoka Handicap ; and Awahuri, a good-looking, well-put-together, four-year-old son of Kainake, placed the Consolation Handicap to his owner’s credit.