Part 31

So, too, I have seen a hind spring up almost in the middle of the pack and endeavour to bother the hounds by running in among the horses. Not the least remarkable thing is the unconcern with which stags look on in the hind-hunting season. I had heard of this, but never saw so flagrant an instance as during the winter of 1905. There was a bevy of hinds on the side of a hill. They were moved by the tufters, which also disturbed a big stag that was lying in the heather. He sprang up and trotted at his leisure up the hill and watched the proceedings. As soon as he understood that hinds, not stags, were the quarry of the day, he strolled quietly back to his lair and laid down again in the place from which he had been disturbed. In the same way bevies of hinds will wheel round, apparently not the least alarmed by the passing of a stag-hunt. Most hind-hunts are long and devious, but every now and then a hind goes right away in a straight line. This, I think, depends a good deal on the cry of the hounds. The red deer, like the fox, regulates its pace by the waxing or waning of the clamour of the pack. As a rule I do not think that Exmoor carries a very good scent in the winter, and the surrounding cultivation is chiefly poor scenting ground. The Brendon Hills, too, do not favour hounds, so that they do not speak much. It is only the sweet scent and enduring foil of a red deer that enables hounds to hunt as well as they do. Of course here as elsewhere there are days when scent is good. With the hind, as with the fox, a strong scent makes a straight-necked quarry, and hounds will drive a hind right away and kill her in an hour and a half or so, which for a hind-hunt is quite a moderate run. It is a very fine form of hunting, especially if you treat it more as a foxhunt than a stag-hunt. The latter is to most people a series of passing pictures of the chase, with a glorious background of wild and magnificent scenery. It is a holiday recreation, rather than a serious business like our winter fox-hunting. But few people make a serious attempt to ride to hounds when hunting on Exmoor. When first I went out hind-hunting I did the same. But I reflected that if one had two horses that it ought to be as possible to see most of the hunt as for the master and the huntsman. Even they cannot go everywhere. Parts of the country are actually impracticable, but they manage in the main to be with hounds. Men who know the country manage with one horse, but the stranger naturally goes further and works his horse harder.

How do you get your second horse? If you send him with the master’s second horse, he is pretty sure to come up with you sooner or later. Of course you can see a great deal with one, but it is unsatisfactory not to be able to see hounds hunt. To enjoy hind-hunting, one ought to see enough to have a general idea of the working of the pack during the whole hunt. Some idea of the way hounds work may be useful, and if, as not unusually happens, the rider finds himself alone with three or four couple of hounds, he can be of use by stopping them; or, if that is not always possible, at all events by keeping the leading hounds in sight, so that when the pack check he may be able to give useful information.

After their second season staghounds generally run mute, or nearly so. Thus they are particularly liable to slip away unseen or unheard. Unfortunately, these are the more experienced members of the pack, which are able to hold to the line of the hunted hind amidst the many temptations to change which will meet them in the course of a winter’s day on the moor. Yet so staunch do the older hounds become, that I have known four couple of hounds to carry the line through Lord Lovelace’s coverts from Culbone Stables (one of the most hind-haunted places in Exmoor) and kill the hunted hind after all in one of the deep-cut combes many miles away. These hounds hunted themselves, but I had the luck to pick them up. Coming over some grass fields only one spoke at all; the same hound with a peculiar shrill note spoke again in the covert when they came out on the moor. The leading hound wasted no breath on talking, but just scoured away. The others whimpered eagerly, but none actually spoke till we touched the wooded side of the hill. In the valley where runs the stream to which two-thirds of the stags and hinds come to die, strangely enough hounds would not speak, though they were on moist grass and the hind was close in front. The leading hound plodded on, always on the line, solemn, intent, resolute, until we actually came up with the hind cowering under the bank by the bridge. She was crouched into so small a space that she was scarcely visible, and her coat harmonised with the brown stream, the dead foliage on the banks, but with the spirit of her race directly a hound bayed her she stood up and faced him as proudly as any stag could have done. The odd thing was how difficult it was to get the hounds to see her, and the old hound that had done all the work seemed to take very little interest in the subsequent proceedings. The rest of the work was done by a large black, tan and white hound, who bayed the hind, hunted her down the water, and was in at the death. The others may have done more, but the silence of staghounds inclines one to give them less than their due credit. The hound, like the man who talks much and loudly, gets the most credit, and in the case of the dog with justice.

If any one wishes to see this fine but little-known sport he cannot do better than go to Minehead, and find a judicious pilot; for it takes an apprenticeship to learn how to ride over the moor in winter. The main principles which experience has taught one, is that heather is reasonably safe going, and to be made the most of, and that in this as in other forms of hunting, the nearer you can keep to hounds the happier you will be.

A friend of mine who came down asked me once for advice, and the answer was: “never lose sight of the hounds if you can help it, and if you do, get back to them again as soon as you can.” A year later he told me, “I have done my best to carry out your advice, and have never seen reason to regret it.” The other matter to be borne in mind is that somehow or another you must go at a fair pace down hill, which to the new-comer looks a great deal more alarming than it really is when you become accustomed to the process. There is another point of view which may be touched on here, and that is that it is not an expensive form of hunting; three stout horses (any will do that are well bred, temperate, and have good shoulders) would afford four and a half days a week. Thus two would go out hind hunting on Tuesday and Friday. One would do a couple of days with foxhounds and harriers, and in most weeks one of the two hind-hunters would put in half a day with the harriers besides. The early spring, March and April, are good months, when the mild western climate will be appreciated. Hunting is slack at home, and we want something new. Well, you have heard of autumn stag-hunting, now try hind-hunting in the early spring.

[Illustration: MR. ALEC GOODMAN, 1852, 1866.]

[Illustration: TOM OLLIVER, 1842, 1843, 1853.]

[Illustration: MR. TOM PICKERNELL, 1360, 1871, 1875.]

[Illustration: JOHN PAGE, 1867, 1872.]

[Illustration: GEORGE STEVENS, 1856, 1863, 1864, 1869, 1870.]

[Illustration: MR. J. MAUNSELL RICHARDSON, 1873, 1874.]

[Illustration: MR. E. P. WILSON, 1884, 1885.]

[Illustration: ARTHUR NIGHTINGALL, 1890, 1894, 1901.]

[Illustration: MR T. BEASLEY, 1880, 1881, 1889.]

FAMOUS LIVERPOOL RIDERS.

Famous Grand National Riders.

To design a picture, and then be able to write personally of the subjects contained therein, is certainly a pleasant phase of magazine work; at least, in illustrating this article and telling all I know of those who hold the best riding records in connection with the still greatest of all steeplechases, so I take it to be. Proud indeed am I to claim either a friendship or marked acquaintance with those gone to the great majority, as well as those remaining with us. The former in my picture consist of Tom Olliver, Mr. Alexander Goodman, George Stevens, and Mr. T. Beasley; of the latter I am pleased to think that Mr. Tom Pickernell, Mr. J. Maunsell Richardson, John Page, Mr. E. P. Wilson, and Arthur Nightingall are very much in the land of the living. I find that in riding in the National my nine friends or acquaintances can boast of accomplishing feats which have not fallen to the fortune of others engaged in the chase. Men like Lord Manners, Captain H. Coventry, and Mr. F. G. Hobson, it is true, were successful in their first and only mounts, a great thing to tell of; then Mr. J. Maunsell Richardson certainly goes one better in scoring two wins on Disturbance and Reugny in his only four efforts. But to stand by my picture. Besides Mr. Richardson, it contains men who have triumphed twice or more, and otherwise figuring at the head of the Liverpool riding records. In my table the amateur, it will be seen, has just a slight pull over the professional. There are five of the one and four of the other, but the professional really comes out on the top, for George Stevens out of fifteen mounts won five, was third once, and never met with a fall, while Tom Olliver and Arthur Nightingall, like Mr. Tom Pickernell and Mr. T. Beasley, have won it three times. It will be seen by the little tabulated figures that in attaining his three victories Olliver rode no less than nineteen times; that is in itself a record.

Won 2nd. 3rd. Unplaced Total of Mounts G. Stevens 5 0 1 9 15 T. Olliver 3 3 1 12 19 Mr. Thomas 3 0 2 12 17 A. Nightingall 3 1 4 7 15 Mr. T. Beasley 3 2 1 6 12 Mr. Richardson 2 — — 2 4 Mr. E. P. Wilson 2 1 0 13 16 Mr. A. Goodman 2 1 1 7 11 J. Page 2 1 1 7 11

The space allotted to me for this article naturally compels omission of a wealth of detail I possess of these splendid records, either left by my father or since collected by myself; indeed, it was my father who introduced me to each of the three riders at the head of the table. Tom Olliver I never saw ride, but it was in the early sixties I first saw him at the side of Fairwater as the winner of the Worcestershire Stakes. He trained the mare, and the portrait here given of this hitherto famous horseman recalls indeed other happy times at Pitchcroft, and of those who then, summer and autumn, visited its races. Tom Olliver must have been a wonderful man. In 1839, the inauguration year of the Liverpool Steeplechase, he was second to Jem Mason on the famous Lottery, which belonged to Mr. Elmore, who likewise owned Gay Lad. The latter gave Olliver his first win in 1842, and the next season, the first year it was transformed into a handicap, he was on the back of the hero Vanguard. His third win, in 1852, was on Peter Simple, in the colours of Captain Little; and when the latter won the chase on Chandler in 1848, Olliver was second on The Curate, half a length dividing the pair. Another of his three seconds, St. Leger in 1847, was only beaten a length, but neither of his three victories, it seems, were close fighting. In his nineteen rides, he only came to grief three times. The result in one of these was a broken collar-bone. The late William Holman once told me that an arm in a sling in later times due to Olliver’s just-referred-to Liverpool fall, prevented his piloting Freetrader, the victor of 1856. Holman, who trained the winner, likewise gave me the information that in seeking a fresh jockey the late Fred Archer’s father was offered the ride, and it was his refusal that gave George Stevens the first of his five Liverpool wins. The last time Olliver, however, rode in the Liverpool was in 1859, so in one-and-twenty years he missed riding only twice. Claudian his final mount, was unplaced; Half Caste won. In or out of the saddle mirth and wit was characteristic of Black Tom, as Olliver was often termed. Indeed, many good stories of his private and public life are recorded in the earliest numbers of BAILY. To reproduce them here would fill pages.

It was at Worcester, as I have said, I made the acquaintance of Tom Olliver, so at the “faithful city” in those youthful days a friendly relationship sprang up in my home, and that which sheltered Edwin Weever at Bourton-on-the-Hill, and that of George Stevens and the Holmans at Cheltenham. Then again of my picture: among my father’s friends were Mr. Pickernell, more publicly known as Mr. Thomas, and Johnny Page. Mr. Alex. Goodman I never shook hands with until at a later period, the veteran then loving to chat of his recollections of Miss Mowbray and Salamander. That was in my early reporting days, which likewise brought me into contact with Mr. J. M. Richardson, at those University grinds some seasons before his most successful Disturbance and Reugny double was accomplished. He was always most kind in imparting information as to his race riding to me. The same I can say of Mr. E. P. Wilson, at a period when he was associated with now almost forgotten chasers bearing names like Starlight, Nebsworth, late Jacob, late Titterstone, and so forth, all before the great striding, but perhaps non-staying, Congress gave him his first four successive Grand National rides. Then of my two other portraits, associations remain of more than ordinary racecourse knowledge. Mr. Beasley is the one, and Arthur Nightingall the other. Indeed, I was pleased to see the last-mentioned put a cap and jacket on for the first time, I think, this season at a recent Kempton meeting. Nightingall, well aware of my being full of National records, jocularly reminded me of the fact that he was “still at it,” only, as he said, “to pass the winning score of Mr. Thomas, Tom Olliver, and Mr. Beasley,” even if he did not last long enough to catch up George Stevens’ five wins.

When George Stevens first won the Liverpool on Freetrader, he had only ridden once previously. That was on Royal Blue, who was unplaced in 1852, and in the three year interim he had no ride prior to his so-called chance winning mount. But of his other victories. When the Colonel won the last of the five, that was his hardest bit of riding, and the only time onlookers in the National saw him fight like grim death and by a neck dispose of his friend and saddle contemporary, George Holman, on The Doctor. On Freetrader I have heard it said he was lucky to win a length from Minerva, as the latter badly over-reached herself at the last jump. When he piloted The Colonel to victory the first time, he won by three lengths, a distance by which he, singularly enough, beat Arbury on Emblematic in 1864. Emblem’s success the year before was quite a runaway victory. Even with her 10 lb. penalty, Arbury there had less chance than with Emblematic. Stevens, of course, thought much of the great double he accomplished for Lord Coventry, but in later years I am inclined to think for “greatness” he leaned more to the side of The Colonel’s repetition. Be that as it may, he was naturally very proud of both, and unfortunately was not spared very long to enjoy a well-earned retirement. For Baron Oppenheim he tried to surpass his already earned record a third year on The Colonel. The weight, however, was too much, and in the position of sixth the second year The Lamb won Stevens rode his last National mount.

It was indeed only a few months after this that his life was cut short by a fall from his cob while riding to his cottage called Emblem, outside his birthplace, Cheltenham. Sad indeed is the story, too long to repeat here, but to commemorate his great Liverpool name and fame, there still exist of him at his native Cheltenham certain mementoes. The house he was born in I believe has vanished, but on the footway by the road-side where he met his death there is a little stone with the plain “G. S., 1871,” upon it to indicate the spot of so sad an end. Furthermore, there is another mark of esteem in the public cemetery. Here is a more conspicuous erection in the shape of a grey granite monument, included in the inscription on which are the names of the four horses upon which he triumphed at Aintree. He married the niece of Mr. Mat. Evans, once part owner of The Colonel. The widow is no more, but I believe the only son is alive and doing well at Derby in a very different calling from that of his father. Those who remember Stevens when he won the Liverpool twice for Lord Coventry, will recall his face beneath a cap he put on as a help to the artist who painted him on Emblem in Lord Coventry’s famous picture. The vignette I place in the centre of my group is, in fact, the original, and was kindly lent me by one of the deceased’s friends, Alfred Holman, who still keeps up the old family training traditions at Cheltenham.

When George Stevens was beaten on The Colonel in 1871, the year proved, perhaps, the most famous of Mr. Thomas’ three victories. It was The Lamb’s second success, and associated with this beautiful little chaser was the fact that Lord Poulett, his owner, had dreamt in the previous December he had seen his horse win with “Tommy,” as he called Mr. Pickernell, in the saddle: and he at once asked the pilot of a previous heroine, Anatis, to ride. The original letter making mention of this successful dream I have seen in Mr. Pickernell’s well-preserved scrap-book, containing much of his riding and other exploits. One of course there finds a deal about The Lamb. Besides the story of the dream, one can glean much of the many efforts of Anatis besides her win. There is plenty, too, of other sporting qualities of her owner, Mr. C. Capel, who, only about twelve months ago Mr. Pickernell followed to his last place of rest. I think Mr. Capel lies in the same cemetery as George Stevens. Now, concerning Mr. Thomas’ third successful ride in the National, well preserved in his book is yet another letter. This is not one of dreams; it is that of congratulation in the hours of Pathfinder’s glory, and is from the pen of none other than the late Admiral Rous. Mr. Pickernell once told me he had few keepsakes of his successful Nationals except those two letters, and to which he then added, “are _they_ not enough to be proud of.” Only twice in nineteen years did Mr. Thomas miss a ride in the Liverpool. His first mount was Anatis, the year before she won; his last occurred in 1877, when he was third to Austerlitz on The Liberator, two years before Mr. Garry Moore won on the last named. The years Mr. Thomas missed mounts in the Liverpool were when Emblem and Emblematic won; not through spills or broken bones, or anything of that sort. Just at that time he became a benedict, and it was family persuasion kept him out of the saddle. Not for long, however, for what he picked up from Tom Olliver was well in the flesh, and of one reception he met with on his return to the pigskin he is quite as fond of talking of as of his three Liverpool victories. And well he might be. The calendar records tell that in 1866 he won all the three steeplechases run at Aintree’s autumn meeting, and they, of course, included the Sefton on Sprite. Here, with a broken stirrup leather carried in his hand, by a neck he beat Stevens on Lord Coventry’s Balder amid great enthusiasm. Mr. Thomas, who lives at King’s Heath, near Birmingham, last September attained his seventy-first birthday, and although if now never seen on a racecourse, he enjoys fairly good health. He likes to compare the old with the new; he knows, too, in his retirement all about regulation obstacles. Did he not give up the official berth of inspector of fences before the National Hunt placed Mr. William Bevill in that position. Mr. Bevill never knew what it was to taste the sweets of a Grand National victory. He is, however, one of those named in its records in connection with many luckless efforts.

Pathfinder’s victory saw the final National ride of another of my subjects, Johnny Page. He there was on the back of Baron Finot’s La Veine, and the French Baron being offended with not a very pleasant greeting at Bristol, curiously enough never tried his luck in the National again. Page, back in England many years ago from France, and down Henley-in-Arden way, is still alive to tell of his experiences of the Liverpool Steeplechase. He won it on Cortolvin and Casse Tête, was second on the former to Salamander, and third, as already said, to Pathfinder. In 1871 he was fourth on Pearl Diver to The Lamb, and all in eleven rides. He had early tuition as a jockey on the flat, for as a lightweight he steered First Lord (5 st. 8 lb.) when he won the Northumberland Plate. This, no doubt, assisted him in being so fine a judge of pace between the flags, and likewise gave him the ability in a finish, so much feared by his pigskin contemporaries. For this most of them gave him praise. One of the number, however, is Mr. Richardson, who, with Capt. Machell, so well managed the Disturbance and Reugny Limber Magna coups. Indeed, at the quiet little Lincolnshire nook even their near neighbour, the late Sir John Astley, according to his own words, hardly reckoned on their achievement. He tells us so in his book, and if he did not participate very much in their sweets he got up a

DISTURBANCE AND NO ROW,