TURF TOPICS.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Issue 1566, 29 April 1920, Page 37

TURF TOPICS.

Amberdown, the crack Queensland performer, is to be trained at Randwick by F. J. Marsden, who has one of the most numerous teams in work on the Sydney side. Artilleryman is to be treated to a spell before being prepared for the important events of the spring. There is some talk of sending the colt to South Australia. He has an engagement in the approaching S.A.J.C. St. Leger, run on the first day of the Adelaide Cup meeting. The New Zealand horseman, Stan. Reid, rode Jack Friar in the Second Steeplechase on the concluding day of ■ the Australian Jockey Club’s recent meeting at Randwick. Reid’s mount was well fancied, being sent out second favourite, but the best he could do was to finish fourth. Just before his death, which recently occurred in England, Charles Witherden, a well-known Kent huntsman of Biddenden, aged 92, imagined that he was still in the saddle, and his last words were, “Tally ho! ” Up to a few weeks before his death the hale old man still rode to hounds. A meeting of the Woodville District Jockey. Club was held recently, when it was resolved that a small committee should be appointed to go into the question of the club running the totalisator and report to a future meeting. It was also decided that stake moneys be paid out to second, third . and fourth horses in the Gore Handicap, concerning which there had been a dispute. Mr. J. L. Stout, S.M., delivered his reserved decision in the Magistrate’s Court, Palmerston North, last week, in the case in which A. J. Shearsby, of Palmerston North, claimed from James Browne, of Old Bushy Park, Kai Iwi, the sum of £8 2s. 6d., being commission alleged to be due on the sale of a gelding, a full brother to Sweet Memory, and a mare, Pretty Helen. His Worship found that plaintiff had not found an actual purchaser for the stock, but a man who intended to- view the horses with an intention to purchase if they were up to his expectations, when the arrangement to sell was cancelled. His Worship gave judgment for the defendant with costs. Respecting the application from the Waipa Racing Club for a two days’ license in connection with its totalisator race meeting, it was reported at the last ’ meeting of the executive that the Minister of Internal Affairs had replied that as all totalisator licenses allowed the Dominion by status had been allotted, there was no day available at present that could be granted the club. “The claims of the club have, however, been noted,” concludes the Minister, “and will receive due con- - sideration in the event of any totalisator licenses becoming available in the future.” It will be remembered that the racing club made application for the two- days license on the grounds that the course was “second to none in its natural advantages—the springing nature of the soil, dryness of subsoil, and extent of. level ground, also a natural amphitheatre, and that the finances of the club were sound. Improvements would probably be made. Members considered the Minister’s letter fairly satisfactory, expressing the opinion that the two days’ license was not far off.