d
as much bottom as other people's, but that they were such slow, good
ones that they never went fast enough to tire themselves.' He had,
however, the gratification of experiencing some few exceptions to this
imaginary rule. In April, 1772, he was so lucky at Newmarket as to win
nearly L16,000--the greater part of which he got by betting against the
celebrated Pincher, who lost the match by only half a neck. The odds at
STARTING were two to one on the losing horse. At the spring meeting at
Newmarket, in 1789, Fox is said to have won not less than L50,000; and
at the October meeting, at the same place, the following year, he sold
two of his horses--Seagull and Chanticleer--for 4400 guineas. In the
course of 1788 Fox and the Duke of Bedford won 8000 guineas between them
at the Newmarket spring meeting, and during these races Fox and Lord
Barrymore had a heavy match, which was given as a dead heat, and the
bets were off.

(72) For some period previous to 1790, George IV. had patronized
horse-racing and pugilism; but in that year, having attended a prize
fight in which one of the boxers was killed, he ceased to support the
ring, declaring that he would never be present at such a scene of
murder again; and in 1791 he disposed of his stud, on account of some
apparently groundless suspicion being attached to his conduct with
regard to a race, in the event of which he had little or no real
interest.

On coming into office with Lord North, in 1783, Mr Fox sold his horses,
and erased his name from several of the clubs of which he was a member.
It was not long, however, before he again purchased a stud, and in
October he attended the Newmarket meeting. The king's messenger was
obliged to appear on the course, to seek one of the ministers of England
among the sportsmen on the heath, in order to deliver despatches upon
which perhaps the fate of the country might have depended. The messenger
on these occasions had his badge of office, the greyhound, not liking
that the world should know that the king's adviser was amusing himself
at Newmarket, when he should have been serving him in the metropolis.
But Charles Fox preferred the betting rooms to Downing Street.

Again, in the year 1790, his horse Seagull won the Oatlands stakes at
Ascot, of 100 guineas (19 subscribers), beating the Prince of Wales's
Escape, Serpent, and several of the very best horses of that year--to
the great mortification of His Royal Highness, who immediately