When the ceremony was over there was an enormous luncheon, followed in the evening by a gala dinner. In a letter which I wrote home at the time, it is evident that I was much impressed with the beauty of the jewels worn by some of the ladies at the banquet! “Some of the women certainly had on the most marvellous jewels; there was one opposite me, whose name I cannot remember, who wore such diamonds as I doubt if I ever saw before, even on Royalties. Donna Franca Florio (one of the most beautiful women of her time) was beautifully dressed, and had on a long row of splendid pearls that reached to her knees. She looked very handsome, as also did Princess Teano. But the beauty of the jewels that were worn impressed me greatly. Some of them looked as if they must have been heirlooms dating from the Renaissance.”
During all these years, some events of which I have been endeavouring to describe, notwithstanding a good deal of duty, much of which entailed being out of the country, I was by no means neglecting racing—a sport to which, in those days, I was very devoted. To go racing meant being amongst almost the pleasantest of one’s friends, and amidst the cheeriest of surroundings, and, in addition, it became more interesting to me owing to the large increase in the size of the Sandringham Stud. The bloodstock in the paddocks there had been largely augmented in the way of brood mares by the purchase, amongst others, of such fine animals as Laodamia and Nonsuch, the natural result being that every year there were more foals and yearlings to inspect, and prophesy about. But racing is a curiously fluctuating business, and, unfortunately, beautiful as these young things were to look at, from 1901 onwards they turned out, with hardly an exception, to be singularly worthless. After Diamond Jubilee’s great year of 1900, for a long spell, Richard Marsh was hardly able to win a race for his leading patron. For the entire racing season of 1901, during which time the King was in mourning for Queen Victoria, the race-horses were leased to the Duke of Devonshire (another of Marsh’s patrons) and ran in his colours. Great things were expected of them. To begin with, Diamond Jubilee seemed to have the three races, open to four-year-olds, at his mercy, but he was a queer-tempered animal and declined altogether to exert himself any further, and though he ran in succession in the Princess of Wales, the Eclipse, and Jockey Club Stakes, the St. Leger of 1900 was his last victory. Lean year followed lean year, and it was not until 1908, when the Sandringham Stud could only send up one colt seemingly worthy of training, that the luck began to turn. To make up for this shortage of colts, the King leased half a dozen two-year-old colts from Colonel Hall Walker (who has lately become Lord Wavertree) and partly thanks to Minoru, one of the leased animals, but mainly to the home-bred Princesse de Galles, who won five nice races, there was at last a respectable winning balance in the way of stakes.
But 1908 was easily eclipsed by the season of 1909, when the King was placed at the head of the winning list of owners. This was mainly owing to the success of Minoru, who won five good races in succession, including the two classics,—namely the Two Thousand and the Derby. The King’s Derby victory was acclaimed with wonderful enthusiasm by the immense crowd at Epsom; His Majesty followed the tradition of leading in his horse, but how he managed to get on to the course, inundated as it was with a surging crowd of enthusiasts, and, having got there, how he ever got inside the neighbouring enclosure again, is almost past the wit of man to understand. However, supported by Lord Marcus Beresford, Marsh, and an Equerry or two, to say nothing of the still more efficient aid of two or three men of the Metropolitan Police, the impossible was duly performed, and Minoru was led in. I was not at Epsom when Diamond Jubilee won the Derby, but I saw Persimmon win, so knew something of the cheering of which an Epsom crowd is capable, but even then it was nothing to the delight displayed by the crowd, when the Derby was won by their own reigning Sovereign.
One other occasion I remember at Epsom, when the crowd was wonderfully pleased and enthusiastic, and that was when Signorinetta had won the Oaks for the Cavaliere Ginistrelli, having scored the double event by winning the Derby two days before. The King and Queen Alexandra were present in the Royal box, and I happened to be in waiting at the time. As soon as the mare’s number had gone up I was dispatched to find the Cavaliere, and inform him that the King wished to congratulate him personally on his dual victory. With great difficulty I succeeded in getting him to accompany me to the Royal box, (so shy and confused was he at the sudden honour that was to be thrust on him), but I eventually succeeded. On his arrival in the Royal box, the King placed him in the front of it between the Queen and himself, so that he could bow his acknowledgments to the cheering crowd. The crowd was delighted, for he was a very popular man in the racing world, especially at Newmarket, where he lived, and though the crowd on Oaks day is very much smaller than it is on the day of the Derby, the cheering was, nevertheless, terrific in its intensity.
But my racing recollections are getting far in advance of their time, and I must revert to a few years earlier and get on with my story.