At last he was used by the trainer as a hack, and, in his absence, taken out by the head lad, when out to superintend the gallops.
I had almost forgotten his existence, when one day I received a letter from my trainer asking me to come down to Newmarket the next day by a mid-day train, when I should find a hack waiting for me at the station, and that he would be at the New Stand, on the race-course side, to meet me, as he wished me to see a trial.
I of course went down and met my trainer at the Stand. After a little conversation, we cantered off to the place where the trial was to come off, and stationed ourselves at the spot fixed for the winning-post. He then gave a signal, and shortly I saw four horses galloping towards us and keeping pretty fairly together until perhaps about two lengths off, when one of them came away from the others, leaving them almost as if they were standing still. "Well," I said, "of course I don't know what the weights are, but that is as hollow a thing as I ever saw. What horse is that?" I asked. To my intense surprise, he said, "Vulcan." "How in the world did you get him to gallop?" said I. "That's rather a curious story," replied the man. "We found it out quite by accident. I was away last week for a day or two looking at some very promising yearlings in Dorsetshire, and Jackson (the head lad) took out the string, riding Vulcan as hack. They were exercising on the Bury side, and a boy who was going rook-tending passed by. Boy-like, when he saw the horses cantering, he blew his horn—to try to give them a start, I suppose. None of them minded it except Vulcan, and he clapped his legs under him and bolted off with Jackson as hard as he could go. When I came back next day he told me about it, but did not seem to think anything of it. However, it struck me differently, so I went and found the boy and told him to come to me the next day with his horn—which he did. I took the string out, and told the boy to blow as we passed him. He did so, and Vulcan again bolted clear away, past all the other horses. So I felt sure I had found out how to make him go, and to-day if you noticed (which I had not) a boy blew a horn as they passed him and the horse again came away, though the others did their best, and he was giving them from 2 lb. to 4 lb."
"You certainly have found out how to make him gallop," I said; "but I don't see how you are always to have a trumpeter about after him." "I think it can be managed," he replied. "I want you to enter him for the Handicap Steeple Stakes at the next meeting. He will only have a feather to carry, and at the time of the race, if you could be with the boy about the T.Y.C. winning-post, and, as the horses come by, tell him to blow, it won't be noticed in the least."
The horse was duly entered and I performed my part, and he won with consummate ease. The scene afterwards in the Birdcage when I went in to see him weighed was most amusing. Everybody was rushing up to me to find out how he had been treated; the most wonderful stories were set about as to the quantity of whisky and port wine that had been administered to the horse, but the facts were as I have stated. He won in the same way and with the same ease in July behind the Ditch. After this we tried him without the horn, and he went fairly, so I put him into a selling race, which he won, and I sold him for a very fair price. I did not hear much of him afterwards, but believe he got back to his old tricks.
Another horse that I bought I knew to be a reprobate when I purchased him. He was a very fine racehorse, and had run well in the Derby—fourth or fifth, I think—and afterwards won several very valuable stakes; but in some of his last races he was severely punished, and this quite upset his temper. He became savage; then he was operated on and turned sulky, and at last developed a curious trick (no one seemed to know exactly how he managed it) of getting rid of his jockeys, nearly causing the death of his rider on two or three occasions. He was sent to Tattersall's to be sold, with various other "weed-outs" from his owner's stable.
I bought him thinking that he might make a steeplechaser, as rogues on the flat often develop into good "'chasers."
Being anxious to find out how he got rid of his riders, a day or so after I had him I ordered him to be saddled, and, mounting him myself, I took him into a thirty-acre field of light plough, thinking, if I got a fall, it would not hurt there. I wanted to find out what he could do, telling my groom to watch carefully and see what his manœuvre was.
Well, I just walked him round the field several times, and he went as quietly as possible; then I trotted him, and still everything was pleasant, and I began to think that the change of scene and course had produced its effect. Next I put him into a canter. At this pace he did not go quite so well, and evidently was looking out for something; but at last he appeared to have settled fairly into his canter. Then, catching hold of his head, I just touched with the spur to make him gallop, when, without a moment's notice, I was sent out of the saddle like a stone from a catapult. When I got up, the brute was trotting away in the opposite direction to that in which I had been riding. I very soon caught him, and going down to my groom, asked him what on earth the horse had done. I need hardly say the man had not seen him. Of course, he said he fancied he heard someone calling just then and looked round; the fact being that, seeing the horse go quietly at first, he thought it was all right, and never took the trouble to watch.
As I was determined to find out the trick, I made my groom mount him. The man rather funked it, and said he had no spurs on; so I gave him mine, and he mounted and went off. However, his reign was not long. Starting in a canter, he tried to gallop the horse, and touched him with the spurs, whereupon the brute shot out a fore-leg and spun round on it just as if he had been a teetotum. Of course, the man flew off, just as I had done. However I saw clearly that he would not bear the spur, and this seemed to be the secret. I mounted him again, without spurs, and rode him round and round for a considerable time, and got him to gallop by degrees, but in a very sulky way. If I attempted to rise in my stirrups, or even move my heel towards his side, I felt he was preparing for his dodge; however, I did not give him a second chance.