THE TOTE IN TOTELAND.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume X, Issue 475, 31 August 1899, Page 15

THE TOTE IN TOTELAND.

A Wail from New Zealand.

It is quite true that we have to go from home to hear news, as the perusal of the following letter (under the above heading), published in the Sydney Referee, will show : — Sib, —During a paper warfare that raged some time ago between a well-known owner and an equally well-known metallician, on the vexed question of “ Tote versus Bookmaker,” the owner wound up his arguments with the statement: “ And the tote never runs away.” Now, I suppose that, with the exception of the two professional handicappers, I see more racing during the year than any other man in New Zealand, and I can prove “ without any possible doubt whatever” that the tote does run away. I have been a punter for over thirty years; I have bet in ,A men ran pool rooms; on English and Indian racecourses; and have betted with the leatherlunged gentlemen and the “infernal machine” all over the seven colonies ot Australasia; but I have Seen more barefaced swindling on New Zealand racecourses under the reign of “ King Tote” than I have ever witnessed anywhere —-Lillie Bridge, Driving Park, and old Hurlingham (Melbourne) included.

A few months ago, at a certain big meeting, an outsider got home by a long neck, with the favorite—generally known as “The Big Horse” — second. The judge actually put up the outsider’s number, when an official, who was standing alongside, said: “No, no! The big horse one —the big horse won !” The judge changed the number, and put up that of *' the big horse,” a'hd we all knew that the official had £25 on “ the big horse” with i bookmaking firm in the South Island. “And the tote never runs away !”

A certain wealthy confederacy, who own a strong stable in, let me say, the North Island, some time ago had three horses in a race—one of them a good one, already returned a winner; another fairly good; and the third one absolutely unknown to the public, but the gang knew that she was the best of the three. They put their heads together and decided to have a go with the outsider, and they made a compact that no matter how much she was paying on the machine, none of them were to put a shilling on, or to tell a friend —the forfeit for so doing was, I believe, £5O. The betting started, the public were falling over each other to back the favorite —the mare who had already made her name. She ran no where, and the outsider romped home, paying a divvy of £24. The crowd had £2OO on her, distributed among the books, all over the colony, at a £lO limit. Of course, had they, or any of their connections, been seen putting even a fiver on her, the public might have dropped to the game, and the divvy would have been spoiled. Another clever gang arranged a very neat coup in a race at a small up-country meeting some time ago. They had a very slippery customer in a race, and they also made a compact that even their best friends were to be “ put in the soup,” or, in other words, it was to be told to everyone that they were “ not having any.” They sent some friends away to the different centres with £2OO divided amongst them, with instructions not to put it on with the “ tote-betting books” until the last minute. Everything worked all right, and the neddy was paying the handsome divvy of £8 10s. The horses breasted the tape and there was a'false start, several of the horses running about four furlongs before they could be pulled up. Before they got back to the startingpost the tote bell was heard to ring, and never stopped until fifty was run up on the clever gang’s gee gee. That was enough for the public. They dropped to the fact that he was a trier, and that this was money coming back from the city books, who were holding too much of him. So they rushed him ; the clever gang had to go, as their money was on, and the horse walked in. Dividend, £1 12s, which meant that the false start did the clever crowd out of nearly £l4OO, and still ‘ the tote never runs away!”

A few months ago a friend and I picked a horse each to win a hurdle race in the North Island. We went to the telegraph office at 10 o’clock on the morning of the race, and wired a fiver each to the secretary to invest on our different fancies. My horse won and paid the nice dividend of £l3. In the natural course of events I ought to have received my cheque in about a week’s time, but I didn’t. About a fortnight after I received a letter enclosing a cheque for £5 and the brief, but distressing, intelligence : “ Your money arrived too late.” Now, the wire was sent at 10 o’clock and the race was run at 1.15 Anyhow, if my money wasn’t on, what about my friend’s, who wired at the same time as me ? Did he get his money returned ? Oh, dear, no ! I was standing alongside the tote on a North Island racecourse a few weeks ago, watching the result of a race. An outsider cantered home, paying a dividend of £22, and as he was passing the post an official rushed over to the machine, and I heard him distinctly say to the man in charge : “ For Heaven’s sake, ring up three tickets On the winner ! I received a wire a few minutes before the race; and forgot it!” Of course they were rung on—the men are practically his servants, engaged and paid by him, and it wasn’t likely they would risk losing their billets. In New Zealand it is, as you no doubt are aware, the custom for the secretaries of clubs to receive money for investment from all over the country. This is known as “ foreign money,” and is generally rung up on the machine before the public start investing on the race. When a Dunedin horse is running—we’ll say in the North Island—it’s a good guide for punters to watch

the amount of “ foreign money ” that’s rung up’ as it is generally a sure sign of a trier. At a race meeting a few weeks ago a very shrewd punter, who seldom makes mistakes, got the wrong information, and put twenty tickets on a horse. A few minutes after investing his £2O he got the whisper that he was on a dead ’un. Did he start cursing his luck, or acting the goat generally —not he! He went to the gentleman who was working the “ honest tote ” and sold his tickets back to him for a tenner. Of course they were re-sold to the poor, long-suffering public, who did not know that the horse they were backing was “ with the angels. “ And the tote never runs away!” If I remember aright, it was an Irishman who, on being asked what sort of a billet he would like if he had his choice, said : “Well, for a nice, clean, respectable job, make me a bishop.” Well, I say, for a nice, clean, respectable, moneymaking billet, make me the secretary of a flourishing racing club in New Zealand. The following incident in connection with tote betting may seem rather hard to believe, but I can assure you it is an absolute fact. Most of the tote bettors in the large cities keep officees, which are known generally by their numbers. A few months two policemen on duty in a city not a hundred miles away from Wellington, met at a corner, and stood talking for a few minutes, the following being their conversation: —Policeman X: “ I wonder what is the meaning of this raid to-day on N 0.666 ?” Policeman XX: “Faith, I don’t know for sure ; but I did hear that the inspector had received several letters from ‘ Anxious Mother ’ and ‘ Suffering Parent’ drawing his attention to the betting shops, and, besides, between you and me and the gate-post, I also heard that No. 666 hadn’t put the old man on to a winner for over a month.”

The tote is a curse, and it will be a cold day for New South Wales if ever it is legalised there. In New Zealand it is breeding a colony of liars from the wealthiest owner in the land to the poorest. He must lie, and lie, and keep on lying. It is fostered by a few so-called sporting papers; one or two of which owe their existence to the printing of tote tickets and the advertising of programmes. An owner cannot be honest or truthful if he tells a friend that he has a good thing : that friend’s few pounds reduces his dividend. The tote-supported Press are continually running down the bookmakers. Why, if it wasn’t for the few books who bet straight-out on the big races even the much-vaunted New Zealand Cup would die a natural death. Let there be no books open on the New Zealand Cup, and what would be the result ? An owner would have to wait until the day of the race, and then take the same price about his horse as the mug-punter, who puts a pound on because the jockey’s colors are the same as those worn by his best girl; or, I suppose, he has the only ticket on the machine on his horse, which is almost impossible. What does he win ?

The tote in New Zealand has neither improved racing or racehorses. It has been the direct cause of dozens of small clubs springing into existence. Of course, the tote-worshippers will argue that if it hadn’t been for the tote, horses like Multiform, Waiuku, Altair, and other equine stars would have never been heard of, as there would have been no stakes to run for, still, the same horses are purchased at almost fabulous prices and taken to a country where tote does not, and never will, exist, and where th Ore is more money given in stakes in one month than in New Zealand in a year. Bujers from Victoria and New South Wales attend our annual sales, and very often pay the highest prices for yearlings to take them to the land of big stakes, big betting, no tote. You have no idea of the number of weeds there at present in this colony. In the North Island especially almost every hotel one visits one finds the landlord with a horse or two. In the big handicap of the year, the New Zealand Cup, there are not more than six horses anything -like first-class.

The tote undoubtedly fosters betting. Fancy a Sydney punter standing in Pitt Street and trying to pick eight races in one day, run at, we’ll say, Bourke, Tumut, or Morce ? Well, that’s exactly what is happening here almost every day in the week. I hold no brief for the bookmakers, but I can safely affirm that in the pre-tote days, when men like Snider, Lyons, Yuille, Harris, Weston, and many other reputable bookmakers were plying their calling, and when an owner could back his horse to win twenty thousand, and get it on settling day, racing in New Zealand was cleaner than it is under the reign of the State-legalished, two-shillings-in-the-pound al-ways-winning-no-matter - who - loses monster — “ King Tote.” —2 ON 2. Christchurch, August 7, 1899.