One Irish Summer

by William Eleroy Curtis

There are many queer-looking people to be seen, in the oddest sort of clothes, from cap to boots. You cannot tell the rank of a person by looks, however. I have seen duchesses whose dresses didn’t fit them at all, and countesses whose faces are so plain that they would stop a clock. I worshiped beside the wife of a “belted earl” at St. Patrick’s Cathedral one Sunday, and her hat looked very much as if some one had sat upon it just before she started for church. The late Duke of Westminster, who was the richest man in the British Empire, had also the reputation of being the most slovenly. Dukes often look as if they were wearing “hand-me-downs,” and the smartest-looking man in an assembly may be the worst rascal of the humblest rank. And that rule, I was told, applies to the race track as well as to other gatherings of mankind.

I saw people who looked as if they had stepped out of the pages of Dickens or Thackeray, so old-fashioned were their garments, their hats, and their behavior. There were tall, gaunt farmers with fiery red faces; solid-looking burghers wearing silk hats and fringes of whiskers under their chins; jaunty military men, dashing young sports in riding habits, and hundreds of farmers in tweed and heavy woolen knickerbockers, nearly every one of them smoking a pipe. The stature of the men was noticeable. There are giants in Ireland in these days. Many of the women were very pretty and wore bright-colored gowns and sunshades that enlivened the scene. And several hideous old dowagers were very keen on betting, and pushed rudely to the front when the horses were running. You can always recognize a coachman, a groom, or a jockey in England or Ireland, and they were so numerous that they didn’t interest us.

The races were conducted very much like ours at home, and in the last one, as is usually the case, the horses were ridden by their owners. There was a field of sixteen, which caused confusion and delay at the starting post and a helter-skelter scramble along the track. Some of the gentlemen riders didn’t come in at all, others were distanced, and the winners were greeted with tremendous applause by their friends and acquaintances, although very little enthusiasm was shown over the ordinary races. In no case did the winner receive a demonstration such as we consider essential in the United States.

Mr. Richard Croker had two entries and should have won the second race, but Lucius Lyne, his Kentucky jockey, as the papers declared the following morning, went to sleep. He led the field easily all the way around and was cantering toward the wire without any show of speed when another horse under whip and spur overtook and overlapped him by a nose. As Croker’s horse was the favorite with long odds, considerable indignation was expressed. He could have won the race without an effort; or at least that is what the men who lost their money on him say.

Everybody bets on the races in Ireland, and the way in which the pink sporting supplements to the newspapers are grabbed on the streets by people in shabby garments indicates that the submerged section of the population feel an eager interest in the results of the races. An ordinary observer would infer that an equal number of people stake a similar amount of money in the United Kingdom and in the United States, but there seems to be no harm done there, or at least not enough to provoke the ban of the law. On the contrary, betting is “regulated.” Bookmakers are all licensed by the government, and if they do not conduct their business honestly, or if they transgress the proprieties in any way, their privileges are taken away from them.

They were scattered here and there among the spectators on the Leopardstown course, but there is evidently a rule requiring them to occupy a fixed place, because each of them stood upon a mat or a little wooden platform or a wagon cushion and never stirred from the spot. Some of them were dressed in a very conspicuous manner—indicating their individuality, I suppose, or carrying out some fad. One wore a bright orange suit that could have been seen a mile or two; another was in brilliant blue, a peculiar shade of that color I had never seen before, and his cap was of the same material. Another was in white duck, with his name painted in large, fancy red letters across his shoulders and across his breast. Each bookmaker wore a sash, upon which his name was plainly printed for identification, as well as the number of his license. Hence we knew that Mike Kelley, Joe Matterson, Timothy Burke, Patrick Sarsfield, George Bevers, and others, no doubt famous in their profession, were present. They were all in the open air in front of the stand, and each bookmaker had a book, a large one, in which he noted every bet as it was made and gave the bettor a ticket to identify it which corresponded with the number in the book. There is considerable clerical work in every transaction; and each bookmaker had a cashier beside him, wearing a leather pouch over his abdomen that hung from a strap around his neck. These pouches seemed to be uniform, and also bore the name and number of the man to whom they belonged. The cashier takes the money and makes the change while the bookmaker is booking the bet, and he cashes the tickets of the winners at the close of each race.

When the bookmaker wasn’t booking bets he was yelling like a lunatic to attract attention. When his lungs were exhausted his cashier relieved him, and in stentorian tones shouted his judgment as to the result of the next race. “Put your money on Cathie,” one of them would yell. “Put your money on Desmond,” came from a red-faced bookmaker a little distance away. “Bet your pile on the field,” roared a third. “Even money on Baker’s Boy.” “I’m giving five to one on Sweet Sister.” “I’m offering three to one on Silver Bell,” and so on. The air was filled with similar cries, which were unintelligible, or at least without significance to a stranger, but we assumed that each bookmaker had favorites that he was booming to the best of his ability.

Well-dressed, respectable-looking women were booking bets as well as men, and mingling with the crowd on even terms. There was no distinction of age or sex or rank or previous condition. And we were told that it was no sign of immorality and no violation of the laws of propriety for a lady to participate in the pools. Some of them, perhaps from a dislike to be jostled by the crowd, sent their escorts to book their bets, but messengers are evidently not allowed. I should judge that the stakes were small. I watched the cashing in of the winning tickets after several of the races, and it was mostly silver and a few pieces of gold that changed hands. I saw but one paper note passed, and you know that the lowest denomination of the paper money is £5. There was perfect order, although there seemed to be a great deal of drinking. There was always a large crowd before the bar between races, but no disturbance at all. The excitement seemed to occur just after the jockeys were weighed and while the horses were trotting slowly to the starting post. When the tapping of a bell told us they were off everybody was silent, and the victor received no applause when he passed under the wire. The winners turned their faces from the race track toward the bookmakers, cashed their checks, and the rest of the crowd strolled off toward the paddock to look over the candidates for the next running.

Richard Croker, late of New York, lives on a beautiful farm of five hundred acres overlooking the Irish Channel, about nine miles south of Dublin, about two miles from the coast and four miles north of the ancient town of Bray, which has been celebrated so many times in song and story. It is an ideal country seat. He has shown the highest degree of taste in selecting the site and improving the property. He calls it Glencairn, and the name is chiseled upon the massive pillars that support a pair of iron gates. These gates are usually open, for he retains his democratic habits and is an excellent exemplar of Irish hospitality. Following a short drive between masses of rhododendrons, laburnums, and hawthorn trees, with friezes and wainscotings of glowing flower beds, one soon reaches a handsome and well-proportioned miniature castle of white granite of pleasing architectural design. And from a flagpole that rises at the top of the tower Mr. Croker sometimes unfolds the Stars and Stripes.

Several people told me that there is no finer place for its size, and Mr. Croker’s home is estimated among the first dozen of country seats in Ireland. It was a rough tract of land when he bought it from one of the judges of the Irish courts, and had been neglected for many years. At a large expense and a great amount of labor he has turned it into a little paradise. What was formerly a wild waste is now one of the loveliest landscapes you can imagine. The house is surrounded by a lustrous lawn and a garden of flowers and foliage plants, and behind it is a series of large hothouses in which he is raising orchids and early fruits and vegetables. About one hundred acres are in wheat, oats, potatoes, and other crops, about ten acres in garden, and the remainder of the five hundred acres is meadow and pasture.