he odds; the more he betted, the more money was
piled on to the unbeaten horse, and yet few took warning, although they
must have seen that the audacious financier was taking on himself an
appalling risk. Well, the peerless colt was pulled out, and, on his way
to the starting post, he began to shake blood and matter from his jaws;
he could hardly move in the race, and when he was taken to his quarters
a surgeon let out yet another pint of pus from the poor beast's jaw.
Observe that the shrewdest trainer in England, a crowd of stable-boys,
the horse's special attendant, the horse-watchers at Kingsclere, and the
casual strangers who saw the favourite gallop--all these knew nothing
apparently about that monstrous abscess, and no one suspected that the
colt's jaw had been splintered. But "information"--always
information--evidently reached one quarter, and the host of outsiders
lost their money. Soon afterwards a beautiful colt that had won the
Derby was persistently backed for the City and Suburban Handicap. On
paper it seemed as if the race might be regarded as over, for only the
last year's Derby winner appeared to have a chance; but our prescient
penciller cared nothing about paper. Once more he did not trouble
himself about betting to figures; he must have laid his book five times
over before the flag fell. Then the nincompoops who refused to attend to
danger-signals saw that the beautiful colt which had spun over the same
course like a greyhound only ten months before was unable to gallop at
all. The unhappy brute tried for a time, and was then mercifully eased;
the bookmaker would have lost L100,000 if his "information" had not been
accurate, but that is just the crux--it _was_. So admirably do the
bookmakers organize their intelligence department that I hardly know
more than three instances in which they have blundered after they really
began to lay fiercely against a horse. They contrive to buy jockeys,
stablemen, veterinary surgeons--indeed, who can tell whom they do _not_
subsidize? When Belladrum came striding from the fateful hollow in front
of Pretender, there was one "leviathan" bookmaker who turned green and
began to gasp, for he stood to lose L50,000; but the "leviathan" was
spared the trouble of fainting, for the hill choked the splendid
Stockwell horse, and "information" was once more vindicated, while
Belladrum's backers paid copious tribute. Just two years before the
leviathan had occasion to turn green o