Coming to the facts connected with the institution of the Goodwood Meeting, it has to be stated on the authority of various historians, that the meeting was founded in a sportive moment by some officers of the Sussex Militia, in conjunction with the members of a local hunt club. The races so organised first took place in the course of the month of April, 1802, a good beginning being made with a purse of £613, little more than the half of which was public money, the sweepstakes entered for amounting to £300.
The meeting was in every respect a successful one, and was continued in 1803 and 1804, but with less popularity, the subscription having fallen off to a very serious extent. In 1810, there were but two days of sport, the money run for being a little over £200. Nor up till the year 1827 was there much improvement; till 1825 the public money subscribed did not total up to a large sum, it varied from £80 to £300, whilst the money received as sweepstakes amounted to something between £60 and £600. Two years later, as has been stated, a great improvement began in the financial resources of the meeting, as was obvious enough from the amount of money which was run for, the total sum in that year exceeding £2,000. In 1829 the racecourse was altered and improved, and the amount of cash expended in the shape of stakes was £3,285. The year following the new grand stand was opened; and in 1831 the Royal purse of 100 gs. was procured to be annually run for.
From this period Goodwood races made great progress; and between the years 1832 and 1835, the average annual amount of the stakes contested for was £6,000. In 1837 the amount had increased to £11,145; and what with the large sum of money spent upon improvements by the Duke of Richmond, and the personal exertions and good management of the late Lord George Bentinck, this meeting made such wonderful progress, that in time it not only rivalled, but even eclipsed many of the other principal meetings.
In 1845, the value of the stakes run for amounted to the large sum of £24,909, a substantial proof that the title of Princely Goodwood was not misapplied. These races, however, fell off somewhat after Lord George Bentinck's death, but yet rank in the first class.
Ascot and Goodwood have been dwelt upon at some length, when compared with the few pages devoted to Epsom and Doncaster; but in the case of these meetings, a considerable portion of space has of necessity been devoted to the Derby and St. Leger, which helps to make an even balance.
VII.
I do not intend at present to say much about gate-money meetings. The premier position must undoubtedly be accorded to that held at Manchester. The best proof of the success which has attended the company carrying on business at New Barnes is, that it has been able to pay enormous dividends to its shareholders, and that its hundred-pound shares, when any are offered for sale, command six or seven times the original price. The Whitsuntide meeting at Manchester, when the weather is favourable for such out-door sports, is attended by hundreds of thousands of persons, all of whom have to pay for their admission to the race-ground at the rate of one shilling or sixpence a head—those desirous of making use of the grand stand, the paddock, and other accommodations, pay for these at the usual rate. It is but fair to say that the vast assemblage of spectators at Manchester conduct themselves wonderfully well. When anything exciting occurs—when a giant roar is set up, it is of course "the voice of the people" that is heard—it is the horny handed "sons of toil" chiefly who rush to New Barnes on the great racing days, and in every respect the scene presented is a contrast to the shows of Ascot and Goodwood, where the "silks and satins" of the upper ten outshine the cottons of Lancashire. But the aim of its promoters is achieved, inasmuch as it brings plenty of grist to their mill, ten thousand shillings counts as five hundred pounds, and ten times that amount is "money," even in "brass-loving" Lancashire.
There is abundance of racing at Manchester, many of the handicaps being enriched by the addition of munificent sums of money. But in respect to the "added money," is it all gold that glitters even at Manchester? It has been complained at any rate that, when the management seem to give a pound, they in reality only give half of that sum; they get back, such is the accusation made, a moiety of what they give in entrance fees or in shares of surplus money from the disposal of winners of selling races. In this matter of what is called "added money," a writer, who comments on the subject, explains that such sums must be taken with the proverbial pinch of salt. For instance, in the matter of a Nursery plate in which a hundred pounds is given from the race fund, it must be taken into account that thirty-two subscribers pay three sovereigns each, so that in such case all that is really given is four pounds, the subscribers running their horses for ninety-six pounds of their own money. There is no charge of any kind made for admission to the heath during the four days of Ascot, and yet the value of the stakes run for there in 1881, as has been stated, amounted to more than thirty-two thousand pounds.
The principal shareholders of the Manchester racing company are reputed to be bookmakers, and if the meeting did not pay as a meeting, there is such a plethora of gambling, of laying and backing, as, in the four days at Whitsuntide alone, will be represented in hundreds of thousands of pounds. It is quite certain, in regard to this racecourse, that the amount of money taken at the gates, no matter what may be said, is really enormous; on the Cup day, the mere shillings of head money, not taking into account the receipts of the stands, will be over five thousand pounds.
The controversy which has raged at intervals over the establishment of what have in a somewhat contemptuous spirit been called "gate meetings," has not ceased. "Prejudice," say they who approve of this system of racing, is "ill to kill"; but it is far better that a race meeting should be made self-supporting than that all kinds of contemptible begging should be resorted to to keep up the pastime in the half-hearted way that it used to be kept up in many localities, by appeals to the lord of the manor and other country gentlemen, by donations from licensed victuallers and miscellaneous shopkeepers who are supposed to reap pecuniary benefit from the bringing together of crowds of people to witness the sport, or by doles from interested railway companies.