Racing was formerly a very rough-and-ready affair, and much was tolerated on a race-course which would be sternly dealt with to-day. Gambling-booths and E.O. tables were easily to be found, whilst little order was maintained on the course. At Tavistock Races in 1815, a sailor with one arm, who had just been paid off, exhibited his skill in horsemanship, to the no small annoyance of everybody, till at length, checking his Bucephalus at full gallop, he was thrown with great violence, by which his right leg was dreadfully fractured.
Cocked-hat races and other eccentric contests were not infrequent features at race meetings. At Hereford races in 1822 a race between three velocipedes, commonly called hobby-horses, created much mirth. They were ridden by three men, dressed in scarlet, yellow, and white jackets. Much skill was displayed, and every exertion used, with the result that white won, scarlet and yellow being both upset, and the riders each receiving a hearty bump, to the great diversion of all the spectators.
The Turf of former days eased the aristocracy of a good deal of money, and many a fine estate changed hands owing to the vicissitudes of racing. Fox of course lost very large sums. He used to declare after the defeat of his horses that they had as much bottom as other people's, but that they were such slow, good animals that they never went fast enough to tire themselves! Occasionally, however, he was lucky. In April 1772 he won nearly £16,000—the greater part of which was the result of bets against the celebrated Pincher, who lost the match by only half-a-neck, two to one having been laid on him. At the Spring meeting in 1789 Fox is also said to have won about £50,000; and at the October meeting next year he realised £4000 by the sale of two of his horses—Seagull and Chanticleer. In 1788 Fox and the Duke of Bedford won eight thousand guineas between them at the Newmarket Spring meeting. Fox and Lord Barrymore had a match for a large sum; this was given as a dead heat, and the bets were off.
On taking office in 1783, Fox sold his horses, and erased his name from several of the Clubs of which he was a member. In a short time, however, he again purchased a stud, and in October attended the Newmarket meeting, when a King's messenger appeared amongst the sportsmen on the Heath in quest of the Minister, for whom he bore despatches. The messenger, as was usual on these occasions, wore his badge of office, the greyhound, and his arrival created quite a stir on the course.
In 1790, Fox's horse, Seagull, won the Oatlands Stakes at Ascot of one hundred guineas (nineteen subscribers), beating the Prince of Wales's Escape, Serpent, and several of the very best horses of that year. The Prince was much mortified at this, and immediately matched Magpie against the winner, two miles, for five hundred guineas. This match, on which immense sums were depending, was, four days later, won with ease by Seagull. At this time Lord Foley and Mr. Fox raced together.
Lord Foley died in 1793; he entered upon the Turf with a clear £18,000 a year, and some £100,000 in ready money—he left it without ready money, with an encumbered estate, and with a constitution injured by cares and anxieties which embittered the end of his life.
Many other patricians were practically ruined on the Turf at about the same time, some by continuous ill-luck, but more owing to the machinations of the many doubtful characters who were experts at what was then known as "throwing the bull over the bridge"—a cant phrase formerly used by frequenters of the race-course to indicate a sporting swindle.
The phrase in question, it may be added, had its origin in the cruel pastime of bull-baiting. When such an orgy of cruelty was over, and the militia of hell which had witnessed it surfeited with blood, the carcass of the bull was dragged to a bridge, over which his quivering remains were thrown into the water beneath!
Many were the queer freaks and fancies of the great pillars of the Turf of the past. Sir Charles Bunbury, for instance, who trained his horses privately under his own eye, made the lads who groomed them wear his colours whilst at their task, in order to accustom the animals to the racing jackets and prevent all chance of nervousness in public. His horses were never allowed to be sweated or tried on a Good Friday, on account of an accident which had on one of these anniversaries happened to a couple of his racers, who had both fallen and broken their backs, each jockey having got a fractured thigh.