WITH THE PROPHETS.
"The ingenuity and industry expended on what is called 'tipping' in connection with horse-racing ought to bring good fortune in no halting measure to the professors of the art, who appear to spend their lives in trying to enrich everybody but themselves."
So wrote, some four or five years ago, an essayist in the pages of one of the "superior" magazines.
That the business of tipping goes on as briskly as ever, the experts in that line of turf illusion being still busily occupied in benevolent endeavours to confer benefit on their fellow-men, can be ascertained by all who will take the trouble to glance over the advertising columns of the numerous sporting journals of the time.
A point worthy of notice in connection with these announcements is the style now adopted in fashioning them. New and improved methods of communicating with the public are constantly being devised. Tipping nowadays is a "business" of importance requiring large dealings with the telegraph; but long ago—say about the close of the "thirties," and in the "forties" of the present century, when the writer became interested in horse-racing, consequent on having won a few sovereigns by the victory of Merry Monarch in the Derby—tipping was much less obtrusive than it is to-day, and was carried on chiefly by means of what may be called "disguises." Such announcements as were made public usually bore that the advertiser was in exclusive possession of information about a horse which was certain to win the Derby or some other important race; but, as a rule, the great event decided at Epsom was, in the beginning of tipping, the race most favoured, and the person advertising not seldom posed as "a gentleman's valet out of a place," or as "a stableman dying of consumption," or "an old military man," or as some person very remote from the being he really was.
"Who, then," it will be asked, "were those persons?" Well, as there were not so many of them as there are to-day, when "tipping," as was said a few months ago to a magistrate, is a "profession," it will not prove a difficult task to give information about their ways of working, as I happen to be able to speak with some degree of knowledge of two or three of the number who were among the first to advertise in days when the mediums for such announcements were anything but numerous, and advertising was somewhat costly, there being then an advertisement duty of one shilling and sixpence exigible on each announcement, whilst postage was also expensive.
In the beginning of race tipping the Queen's head had not been invented. The outside prophets had at first only a local audience, but even during the "thirties" London was occupied by a vast population, and there was always a sufficient percentage of its inhabitants so interested in racing as to find employment for half-a-dozen tipsters, in addition to those engaged on such newspapers of the time as kept prophets, some of whom were "verse-jinglers" of no mean capacity, as a selection from their poetic prognostications would prove, were a collection of the best of them to be made and published with the necessary notes of explanation.
The first of the prophets to whom I will refer were a man and a woman, both persons of ability, able to assume a variety of characters, and by doing so carry on their little game industriously from season to season. There was no collusion between them, however; they were in no way connected.
The man, before he began work as a tipster, had been for several years under butler in one of the big Pall Mall clubs, and having drawn the winner of the Chester Cup in a plethoric "sweep"—many of which used to be, and I believe still are, organised in London in connection with the more important races—he found himself in possession of sufficient funds, including the money he had saved in service, to become lessee of a public-house in a little street off Fetter Lane, in which for a time he did well, so well that he took courage and married, his wife being able to assist him in his business.
It is almost needless to say, with a landlord possessed of a taste for the turf, his house came in time to be much frequented by the smaller fry of sporting men having tastes in common and being fond of betting, although the sums risked seldom exceeded half-a-crown, or at most double that amount.
One evil day a constant frequenter of the house introduced a friend of his, who was anxious to start a betting list, and as Wingrave, the landlord, thought a list in the house would improve his business, he gave consent, and Bill Holmes commenced business at the "Caxton Arms." For a period of a little over twelve months all went well, customers increased, money was made, and claims punctually met.
At length there came a frowning of Fortune. The list-keeper was himself a keen bettor, and more than once "perilled his purse" by having all his money on an animal he thought "sure to win." Having backed a horse on his own account to win a particular Chester Cup—in those days the "Tradesmen's Plate" was a most pronounced betting race—and the animal having failed to do what was expected. Holmes was unfortunately unable to come to "the scratch" over the animal which did win, and knowing he could not meet the claims which would be made against him on behalf of the winner, which had been heavily backed at his list, he at once left London, to the great consternation of Wingrave, who dreaded he would in some way be held responsible for the misdeeds of the runaway list-keeper. His foreboding was more than realised; an incensed mob of the creditors of Holmes, taking the law into their own hands, all but wrecked the house. It was in vain the landlord told the crowd he had no concern with the defalcations of the list-keeper; the people would not be pacified. Out of the affair there arose a police case, and although Wingrave was able to convince the magistrate that he had himself been a victim, and had been more sinned against than sinning, he was deprived of his license at the first opportunity, and was unable to obtain possession of another house. Luckily, although two days' drawings had been confiscated by the enraged punters, the ill-used landlord, after paying all claims, had still a few pounds at his banker's, when he was compelled to shut shop.
Nothing in the public-house line of business being likely to turn up, Wingrave, by the advice of his shrewd wife (her father had been a pugilist, and afterwards lessee of a gin-shop in the region of Lambeth), turned tipster, and under the designation of "a retired club steward," offered to give all who pleased to forward half-a-crown to his house in Pemberton Row the name of a horse which would win the Derby; or to those who entrusted him with double that amount, he promised, in addition, to give the name of a filly that would be first in the Oaks, and so ensure a remunerative double event. His Derby prophecy proved a true one, the horse he gave being Voltigeur. The filly prophesied for the Oaks, however, only attained the rather barren honour of a place; still, the tip was considered a good one, fair odds being attainable, which led to much business being done in respect of the next two or three tips. Voltigeurs, however, do not run and win every day, and in time Wingrave came to know by the falling off which took place in the remittances that he would require to make a new departure, which he at once did.
His next move was made in the disguise of "Henry Buckstone, late valet to a sporting nobleman, who, being in possession of several important racing secrets, will send the winners of Two Thousand Guineas and Chester Cup to a select number of gentlemen on receiving a remittance of five shillings." Communications were to be addressed to a stationer's shop in Holborn, and for a time letters came in abundance, as many on some days as fifteen. Once again, as may be said, the ex-publican "struck ile," and a flow of fortune resulted which, happily for Wingrave, was kept up by the consecutive selection of some six or eight good winners. But in time this tipster, like others before and after him, dropped out of notice, although it is certain that he flourished, like the proverbial green bay-tree, for several years.
During the period which Wingrave carried on business, tipsters had much in their favour, the big events of the season being betted upon for months before the day set for their decision.
Fifty years ago, for instance, quotations on the Chester Cup were numerous in the December of the year previous to its being run. Such arrangements, of course, helped the tipsters of the outer school, as people were early in the field to back their fancies or the selections of the adventurers who sent prophecies. For these men the fact of being occasionally successful in naming the winner of a great race, at what was thought a "long price," was just so much capital gained. Two or three successful tips enabled a man to play "the game" to a remunerative tune for at east six months; every time he advertised he obtained numerous replies on the strength of his previous successes.
Before the advent of the "retired club steward" there was a person at work whose success as a tipster was the subject of much gossip among needy bettors; this was the lady tipster already referred to. Yes, a veritable woman, and clever at the work! I first heard about her in "Jessop's," a night house in Catherine Street, among the frequenters of which her tips seemed to have made an impression. The little badly-printed circular containing her prophecies was signed "A. M. Weather." The name of this female foreteller of turf events was said to be Adelaide Merryweather; she was, so I was told by some of the "knowing ones" who frequented "Jessop's," the widow of an actor who had been engaged for a time in one of the then transpontine theatres as a delineator of small parts. The woman's own name was Weather, her husband's name being Merry, and the nom de plume she adopted as a prophetess was a combination of the two; but she traded in tips under other names as well, one of them being John Screwman. Her house, or at least one of the places to which her letters were sent, was in Chapel Street, Soho Square, and, as the postman of the period would have been able to testify, she carried on a thriving business.
Another of the names assumed by Mrs. Merryweather when she put on her prophetic mantle was, if my memory is not proving treacherous, "Arthur Lancefield, late of Middleham." I am writing only what I know, or what I believe from trustworthy information to be true, and my belief is that Mrs. Merryweather was, if not the "inventor" of the method of sending the names of different horses to different batches of applicants, one of the earliest tipsters to adopt and systematise the plan. Trading as she did under three or four noms de plume, she speedily accumulated a long list of names of persons who backed horses; so that when she adopted another name and changed her address, she could send circulars to former customers stating that, from private information which she had received, she believed Mr. Brown Jones (or any other person) was anxious to find out the winner of the Derby (or whatever race might be on the tapis), and that, on receiving half-a-crown, a rare double event would be forwarded to his address.
One of this woman's most successful hits was reported to have been made in the character of an invalid jockey's wife, her circular on that occasion being worded as follows: "A jockey's wife, her husband being unable to ride now in consequence of having sustained a paralytic shock of the lower limbs, does not ask for charity; but being anxious for the sake of her young children to earn a living, will be glad to hear from gentlemen who take an interest in racing. Her husband, having been a noted trial-rider, knows well the form of all the horses now running. Address, Sarah Chiffman, 94A, Great Pulteney Street, Golden Square." This advertisement, I was told, was looked upon as being genuine, and also that half-sovereigns, to cover letters from the date of its issue to the day of the Cambridgeshire, were liberally contributed to the wife of the unfortunate horseman; many people connected with racing affairs fancied by subscribing that they would obtain "something good," whilst the fact of three winners of three races, and a second and third in two more being given to start with, was thought sufficient evidence of the bona fides of the advertiser.
For three or four years Mrs. Merryweather experienced a prosperous time, customers being numerous, as, by means of her system of sending different horses to different persons one or more batches of them were certain to have had winners sent to them, and these fortunate ones were not slow to sound the trumpet of her fame among their friends, so that on some occasions she enjoyed a run of success. How her career ended I cannot say from personal knowledge. Fred Booth, a frequent visitor to "Jessop's," and afterwards a bookmaker in a considerable way of business, used to relate that she married one of her clients, a wholesale grain merchant in the North of England, who had found his way to her house intent on giving the prophet a very handsome present in return for a double event which she had been lucky enough to send him. The gentleman was greatly surprised on discovering that his tipster was a woman, and a good-looking one, possessed of refined manners; and according to Booth, who spoke as if he knew the gentleman, the story came to a conclusion in the neighbouring church in the most orthodox fashion.
I can from personal knowledge describe the doings of one of the tipping fraternity. About the year 1842 or 1843 (I am not sure which of these years it was), I went one evening to Sadler's Wells Theatre to witness the play of King John, and after the tragedy I supped with one of the actors in his lodgings in Arlington Street, near the theatre. We were joined at table by a fellow-lodger of my friend, who seemed to know nothing but what savoured of the turf, and he was so complaisant as to tell me the names of several horses which were pretty certain to win, and, as I know, did win some of the coming events. Being invited, we shared a bottle of capital claret along with him in his "den," as he called his parlour, in which I noted, scattered about, some dozens of newspapers and especially several copies of Bell's Life.
When opportunity offered I asked my friend who his fellow-lodger was. "Well," he replied, "he is, or rather has been, on the press, having some three or four years ago been connected with one or other of the minor weekly publications; but he is now, he tells me, playing a far more profitable part; he has become a racing tipster and makes a good income at that business. His plan is to select about ten or a dozen of the most likely horses and send a different one to win the race and another, or perhaps two others, to get places, to each of his customers, taking care, of course, to keep a record of what he does, and the names and addresses of those who correspond with him.
"Two or three years ago he made quite a hit with a horse called Little Wonder, which, as I dare say you know, won a Derby. That event, my dear boy, set him on his legs; the landlord of the big gin-palace not far from here, who won a good round sum by means of his tip, gave him a present of fifty pounds, and judging from his correspondence and the many persons who evidently call to consult him he must be making money, but whether or not he may be taking care of it is another matter. I suspect, however, it is with him as it often is with others similarly circumstanced, a case of 'lightly come, lightly go.'"
This plan, often since adopted, of sending different horses for wins and places to the different applicants for tips, was in my opinion quite a stroke of genius; the "fine art" of tipping indeed.
Such reminiscences might be multiplied. I was at one time brought into contact with several adventurers of similar kidney to those described, and there are no doubt aged turfites who could supplement what I have said. Previous even to the period I have been attempting to illustrate there was being published a regular racing circular, the precursor of the Lockets, Judexes, and Walmsleys of a later period, whilst newspaper tipping, especially in the columns of certain of the London weekly newspapers, was greatly extended; in not a few of them a "real poet" gushed forth his prophetic lore, and, as has been stated already, not a few of the poetic predictions perpetrated some fifty years ago were exceedingly felicitous in their diction, considering the sometimes very uncouth matter that had of necessity to be dealt with. I remember reading upon one occasion a collection of such poems in a Bow Street tavern (it was kept, I think, by Baron Nicholson), and of being struck with the halting lines and bald phraseology of three or four of the Seven Dials sort, that used at one time to be hawked round the public-houses at which sporting men were wont to congregate. One sample of the doggerel—I am not speaking now of the graceful contributions published by Bell's Life or The Sunday Times, but of the Cattnach kind, written for recital in public-houses, one of which I well remember—proved a fortunate tip, as it wound up with an excellent prophecy:
All who desire to quench their very great thirst
Must back my bright fancy, brave Pyrrhus the First.
Another of the kind, after dealing with all the animals likely to start for the race (more than a dozen), pronounced boldly in favour of the horse that won, winding up his narrative with the following rather clumsy lines:
Now this fair chance is given, play you your cards right well,
Take my advice—down with your dibs on the bold Dayrell.
I am quoting these lines from memory, and another concluding couplet dwells in my remembrance:
Coldrenick! Coldrenick! the crowd loudly cry,
But Attila's the animal that wins, in my eye.
afterwards altered by "the poet" to:
Coldrenick! Coldrenick! the crowd loudly shout,
But to-day I set down as Attila's day out.
In respect of the art of really "poetical" tipping, there are few who know how very difficult it is to render the matter presentable; the names to be introduced are sometimes not amenable to the treatment of the poet, no matter how heartily he enters on his task. As one gentleman said to the writer, "to work all these probable starters into readable rhymes, far less to clothe them with some degree of poetic fancy, would need a couple of Tennysons, four Brownings, and half a score each of Swinburnes and Buchanans rolled into one, and even then the product of the lot united might not seem to the editor all it ought to be."
Nowadays every newspaper of importance has to furnish a daily modicum of sporting intelligence, which proprietors find to be a costly item in the ever increasing sum of their expenditure. But it is a circumstance that cannot be helped; there is in reality more interest taken in the handicaps for the Cesarewitch and Cambridgeshire by five-sixths of the readers of the daily papers than there is in all the other items of news added together; indeed, it is not going too far to affirm that two or three of the daily newspapers are indebted for the larger portion of their sales to the fact of their giving every morning a detailed programme for the races of the day, as well as other sporting intelligence. Excellent information of its kind is purveyed by the members of the sporting press, who contribute to these journals; but the tips given are, except to the merest novices, of little use, as veteran bettors can, by the aid of their Ruff or McCall, select horses for themselves.
In addition to the racing news contained in the ordinary run of newspapers, there are three daily journals published all the year round which are solely devoted to sporting news, and these papers deal of course in "tips," and some of them afford a place in their columns to a full score of the daily increasing army of vaticinators; and yet, as must be patent to those who devote time and attention to the study of such matters, no betting man could possibly make a fortune, or even earn a living, by abjectly following either or all of the honest newspaper tipsters referred to.
It is amusing to note how some of the more "screeching" of the newspapers comport themselves. When one of them, for instance, after a period of six or seven weeks, becomes some day so fortunate as to select three or four horses that win as many races, it shouts out next day in loud tones so that all may have news of its prescience—a supremely Irish mode of telling readers that to follow its tips would be ruinous. One day's luck out of twenty or thirty simply means to backers "fell despair," and much of it. There is (or was lately) a tipster who is never done sounding his own praises; "as I predicted, Chance did the trick easily," "my selection Accident in a walk," "I gave two for such and such a race, and my first selection Happy-go-lucky literally romped in."
But what of that, when backers of the two lost their money, the romping in horse starting at odds of 3 to 1 on him! Let us suppose that some sanguine speculator had risked a five-pound note on each selection (because when two horses are selected it is necessary to back both in case of missing the winner), the result would have been a loss of £5 on No. 2 and a gain of £1 13s. on No. 1, showing a balance to the bad of £3 7s. But, notwithstanding, the tipster in question crowed over this feat of tipping, just as a bantam cock does when he is surveying the half-dozen inmates of his harem.
These details will not probably be pleasant to the gentlemen of the sporting press; but there are among them several who have no occasion to assume that my remarks are personal, because they are persons possessed of knowledge, who announce their selections in a modest manner, and give good reasons for their faith; but for the kind of tipster who told his readers not only that Pioneer would win the race for the City and Suburban Handicap, but would do easily, I have but scanty respect. That tipster must surely be a green hand at the business! Why did he not add that if the horse did not win easily he would eat him? "Will win," instead of "may win," is a mistake in tipping often committed by some even of the veteran press tipsters.
Pressmen who review past races and prophesy on future events are compelled, like jockeys, "to ride to order"; in plain language, they must found their tips on the public form of the horses commented upon. It is not any part of their work to "guess" that any particular horse will win a race; hence it is that the professional prophets are now and again completely "floored" by the victory of an animal they dared not even assume to have been possessed of a chance. It is always on the cards that an outsider may win.
There are every day busily at work at the present time an army of over two hundred and fifty advertising tipsters—pure adventurers, recruited from all sorts and conditions of men. The writer took pains, three or four years ago, to ascertain, by personally interviewing a number of them, what manner of men they were. His idea of the kind of persons he had supposed them to be was at once corroborated, as the first of them with whom he could obtain an interview he immediately recognised as a bookmaker who had welshed him at Ascot two years before; another of the fraternity was identified by a friend as a "swell cabman," who used to have a lucrative connection in the City, his customers being chiefly stockbrokers and bankers' clerks; but more surprising than either of these was the discovery that among the motley crowd, and evidently, from the fact of two clerks in an outer office being busily engaged in filling up telegraphic forms, doing a roaring trade, there was a younger son of a very well known and wealthy London citizen, who, having failed at the University, and "gone to the bad" in business, had taken to tipping.
Well do I remember reading one morning in The Standard that Bill Jones, one of "the ruins" bookmakers, had been sent for ten days to prison as a rogue and vagabond for betting, the alderman who passed the sentence being the uncle of the tipster to whom I have been alluding!
Could a census be taken of these prophets, embracing their antecedents, it would be found that not a few of them were persons who had lost money in backing horses or in laying the odds against their chances, reminding us of the celebrated definition of the critics being "men who have failed in literature and art."
As has been remarked in the course of the foregoing observations, the art of tipping is now a business over which no disguise is thrown, although an occasional advertisement still crops up in the old style. One or two of the present-day tipsters correspond with "gentlemen only," but on being communicated with, these persons do not seem particularly anxious to restrict the number of their clients; what they really want is "a remittance." At the present time there are tipsters who carry on business in different fashions; some ask for a fee that will cover a week's work, others seek an all-day remittance, whilst not a few deal in single-horse wires or "paddock snips," as they designate their information. There are also tipsters who ask only to be paid by results. "Put one shilling on each of the horses I select for you to back, and if one wins, remit me the odds obtained," indicates the mode of doing business adopted by such prophets.
As a matter of course, the tipsters of the time are ever varying their names and addresses. When they make a series of hits under one designation they trade on that as long as they can, but when business begins to decrease because their tips fail to disclose winners, then a change of locality and another name gives chances of renewed good fortune. Thus the man who was "A. 1." a month ago is now figuring as "X. Y. 3.," whose tips, "privately given," made the fortunes of several gentlemen two years ago, "so that I" (that is "X. Y. 3.") "am induced to allow the general public to participate in my information." About the period of the Derby in each year I take stock of the tipsters' advertisements, and have found, as a general rule, that only about thirty per cent. of those who advertised in the previous year remain in the field—the others having either retired or changed their names and addresses.
The class of tipsters of whom I have been writing earn a great deal of money, but many of them spend it recklessly, never thinking that they may be overtaken by the proverbial rainy day. Judging from the vast number of telegrams which are despatched on busy race-days, two or three thousand pounds a week must reach these tipsters, the majority of whom make it a rule, I fancy, to incur no expense for information, although some among them are always boasting of their staff of highly-paid assistants. These men take the tips given in the morning newspapers and retail them to the fools who trust them for a shilling, or perhaps half-a-crown, whilst the simpletons who purchase the information could obtain it for one penny, and all the news, political and social, as well!
Of the fools who are born in every minute of the day and night, a very great number deal with the advertising tipsters to their ultimate loss. It is only right, however, to let it be known that there are a few honourable men among the blacklegs who take much personal trouble and incur considerable expense in obtaining information of a reliable kind for those who trust them. But these men fail to make backing pay; they no doubt experience runs of luck, but even with runs of luck the balance at the close of the year is sure to be on the wrong side of the account.
The proprietors of several weekly racing periodicals at present published, not satisfied seemingly with the sales of fifty or sixty thousand copies which they say their papers attain, send out daily tips by telegraph, or pen nightly letters to all who will pay the requisite fee, and according to their own accounts of what they achieve their success as tipsters is enormous; but it may be fairly stated on behalf of the gentlemen who cater sporting news for the daily press, that considering the difficulties incidental to the formulating of their prophetic work, they do wonderfully well, although it has been often stated against them, as a matter of reproach, that they "follow the money"—in other words, tip those horses which are being or are likely to be heavily backed.