by Jim Haynes
Evidently the gentleman from the north did not coincide with my views and just wanted to make tracks.
Happily no great harm was done, only one side of the car was burned, through some of the rods being overheated.
An amusing account of the incident appeared in the Melbourne paper Bohemian. Here is the extract, which I happened to come across:
The true story of the fire on board the Sydney express, about a week ago, has not yet been told. No one has yet ventured to describe the scene in the interior of the car after the alarm was sounded.
The alarm of ‘Fire’, when uttered in a shrill voice in the small hours of the morning, never fails to have the desired effect on the soundest sleeper, especially if the cry be uttered by a female. On this occasion it had the desired effect on every soul in the carriage.
A lady who slept in a berth by the door heard it first and, running out into the passage that traverses the carriage in her robe de nuit, was confronted by the stalwart figure of Dibbs, the new Premier, who was vainly trying to find his way into the trousers of Nat Gould, the author of The Double Event.
Nat Gould is fat and short and Dibbs is a big fellow, and slim with an altitude of six feet three inches. When the alarm was given, Gould promptly seized hold of Dibbs’s clothes and made straight for the open air. By the time Dibbs got his eyes open there was only one pair of trousers available and they were Gould’s.
When he met the hysterical female in the curl papers, the New South Wales Premier had only got one leg into Gould’s unmentionables, but he struggled manfully to cover the other leg with a newspaper.
Gould’s plight was even worse. He had got his legs into the sleeves of Dibbs’s shooting-jacket and, when he was discovered out on the line a few minutes later by the guard, he was carrying over his arm a set of ladies’ overalls, which he had borne off triumphantly in his flight.
Such is the account given of this memorable episode involving myself and the Governor of New South Wales.
What an awful Cup it was in 1892.
I have been at race-meetings in all sorts of weather in the old country and elsewhere, but I never recollect a more uncomfortable day than when Glenloth won the Cup. Torrents of rain came down and deluged everybody and turned the course into a quagmire on the far side.
All the fashionable world turned out as usual. Nothing short of an earthquake would prevent Melbourne people from going to the Cup, and even then, when the course was clear, they would sit on the ruins of the stands and watch the race!
The lawn became very slippery and it was amusing to see the numerous spills as some well-dressed swell measured his length in the mud and then got up to shake himself like a Newfoundland dog.
The rain poured down like a second deluge when the horses came out. The mud flew up in a shower in the preliminary canter and in the actual race it can easily be imagined what it was like. I was in the press box on the top of the grandstand and at the back of this, some distance away, is ‘the hill’, which was crowded with a wet, miserable mass of people.
Umbrellas were put up by some people on the top of the stand, but loud shouts from the people on the hill ordered them to be shut. Many declined to close their umbrellas and a shower of mud in lumps came rattling down on them from the irate crowd on the hill. This had the desired effect. On the flat there was a perfect forest of umbrellas and it was a strange sight as seen from our box. As for seeing the race, it was well nigh impossible and, when the horses flashed past the post there was a cry of ‘What’s won?’
When Glenloth’s number went up it put the finishing touches on backers’ misery. The horse was a rank outsider and fifty to one could have been had about him in places.
Glenloth was a good stamp of a horse, but the wet day was all in his favour. He might have won under any circumstances, but the heavy going assisted a horse of his build.
An incident that happened to me over this race shows how unwise it is to put a man off backing a horse when he fancies it.
Before I left my hotel in the morning, one of the waiters asked me to put a pound on Glenloth for him. I laughed at him, and told him to keep his money in his pocket. He did, with the result that he was about fifty pounds worse off after Glenloth won, as he would have procured that amount to his pound.
I shall never forget the mournful look with which he regarded me after the event. I had serious thoughts about changing my table, in case a concoction of arsenic fell into my soup by mistake. Thinking to make things better, I advised him to back Trieste in the Oaks. He did, and she lost, though she ought to have won, which only made matters worse.
Moral: always keep your information to yourself, and then you will be the only sufferer.
The year following Glenloth’s wet Cup I again found myself in Melbourne for the two big meetings at Caulfield and Flemington.
The 1893 Cup was won by another outsider, Tarcoola. Once again I had a bad time, as I backed Carnage for the double, the Derby and the Cup. Carnage won the Derby all right, but just failed in the Cup as he ran second after making nearly all the running.
It is curious how men sometimes miss a good win. One morning I was coming off the track with Mr Frank Wilkinson, a well-known pressman and handicapper, when he turned around and said, ‘Stop a minute, Nat; here’s Tarcoola going for a spin.’
‘Hang Tarcoola,’ I said, ‘I’m in a hurry for breakfast.’
Frank had, however, got his watch on them, and I waited until the gallop was over.
‘By Jove! That’s a great go!’ said Frank, looking at his watch. ‘It’s worth taking a few pounds about Tarcoola at one hundred to two or three.’
I said, ‘We’ll think about it. You can get a bit of money in the Club, and I’ll go you halves.’
Unfortunately, Frank did not get the money and, a day or two after, Tarcoola did such a bad gallop I forgot all about him until I saw him beating my pet fancy, Carnage, in the Cup. I believe Frank wired the result of the good gallop to a friend in Sydney who won a thousand pounds on Tarcoola. Such is luck.
Tarcoola won cleverly from Carnage and Jeweller, with Loyalty well up close, and again the public were floored, as Tarcoola started at a very long price.
The last Cup I saw, before sailing for London, was in 1894. Again an outsider landed the race when Patron won, and it was a most extraordinary victory, as I will endeavour to show.
Patron was a very good three-year-old and, naturally, he was backed early in the season for the Cup. On paper his chances looked as good as anything in the race. Some of the first double-event wagers booked were for Paris in the Caulfield Cup and Patron in the Melbourne Cup.
Before the date for the Cup arrived Patron went wrong, and his name gradually receded from the betting list until, shortly before the race, long odds could be had about his chances.
Dawes, the jockey who rode Patron, had not much faith in his mount either and Mr Purchas, the owner, also laid off as much of his money as he could. I believe as late as the evening before the race it was not decided whether Patron would run or be scratched. This was certainly not encouraging to anyone who had backed the horse.
It was, however, decided to start the horse and let him take his chance, and, much to the surprise of everyone, he won the Cup after a good race with Devon and Nada.
Bravo and Patron were both sired by the only unbeaten Cup winner in history, Grand Flaneur, who won in 1880 and started nine times for nine wins.
CARBINE’S MELBOURNE CUP, 1890
ANONYMOUS
The race is run, the Cup is won, the great event is o’er.
The grandest horse that strode a course has led them home once more.
I watched with pride your sweeping stride before you ranged in line,
For far and near a ringing cheer was echoed for Carbine.
The start was made, no time delayed before they got away,
Those horses great, some thirty-eight, all eager for the fray.
No better start could human heart to sportsmen ever show
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As Watson did, each jockey bid get ready for to go.
With lightning speed, each gallant steed along the green track tore;
Each jockey knew what he must do to finish in the fore.
But Ramage knew his mount was true, though he had ten-five up,
For Musket’s son great deeds had done before that Melbourne Cup.
No whip, nor spur, he needs to stir a horse to greater speed;
He knew as well as man can tell when he could take the lead.
So on he glides with even strides, though he is led by nine;
But Ramage knows before they close he’ll try them with Carbine.
The bend is passed; the straight at last: he takes him to the fore.
The surging crowd with voices loud the stud’s name loudly roar.
The jockey too, he full well knew the race was nearly o’er,
As on his mane he slacked the rein: no need to urge him more.
Brave horse and man who led the van on that November day!
Your records will be history still when ye have passed away.
For such a race, for weight and pace, has never been put up
As that deed done by Musket’s son in the 1890 Cup.
DREAMING TO WIN
JIM HAYNES
Dreams and premonitions have long been a part of Cup folklore. There are many accounts, mostly unsubstantiated, of people dreaming the winner. Shearers riding miles but arriving too late to place a bet having dreamed the winner in an isolated shearing shed; housewives telling husbands the name of the winner before the race due to women’s intuition, a premonition or cryptic dream, only to be ignored or laughed at by the husband until proven right on race day.
The most famous Melbourne Cup dream story is the one concerning Walter Craig, owner of the 1870 winner, Nimblefoot.
Craig was the owner and the licensee of Ballarat’s Royal Hotel. He had purchased the hotel in 1857, at the height of the gold boom. It was originally known as Bath’s Hotel but, after Alfred Duke of Edinburgh stayed there in 1867, it became known as the Royal.
In the same year legendary horseman and poet, Adam Lindsay Gordon, took over management of the hotel’s substantial stables and livery business. Walter Craig and his horses are mentioned several times in Gordon’s verse.
In August 1870 Craig dreamed that he saw his horse, Nimblefoot, winning the Melbourne Cup. The horse carried Craig’s violet silks but the jockey was wearing a black armband in the dream.
Craig recounted the dream to several people and died within days of the premonition. An account of this strange event did appear in The Age just prior to the running of the Cup, which lends some credibility at least to this piece of Cup folklore.
Needless to say, the horse subsequently won the Cup with the jockey wearing a black crepe armband to mark the passing of the owner.
Walter Craig’s death is the central feature of another piece of Melbourne Cup mythology. It seems that Craig and a group of friends, including well-known bookmaker Joseph Slack, were drinking at Craig’s hotel in February 1870 when Craig asked the bookmaker what odds he would give on an AJC Metropolitan Handicap–Melbourne Cup double featuring Croydon and Nimblefoot.
The bookmaker, in a spirit of conviviality, offered to bet £1000 against a round of drinks for the group and Craig duly obliged. Although the double proved successful, Craig died before the result was finalised and, according to the unwritten rules of gentlemanly sportsmanship, death cancels out debts of honour.
Legend has it, however, that Joseph Slack chose to honour the bet made with his friend and paid Craig’s widow the £1000. A second account of the story has the bookmaker paying £500 to the widow in order to appear honourable while still acknowledging the accepted rules of sportsmanship surrounding such verbal, or ‘handshake’, bets.
Stories of ‘dreaming the winner’ had become such an accepted feature of the annual Cup publicity barrage by 1886 that a young Banjo Paterson was able to use the idea as the basis of a comic poem, ‘A Dream of the Melbourne Cup’. Published in The Bulletin just prior to the Cup of that year, the poem has several interesting elements.
For one thing it demonstrates Paterson’s parochial support for his home colony of New South Wales and reminds us just how fierce the rivalry was between that state and Victoria.
Paterson, who was a member of the first New South Wales polo team to play against Victoria, sees the race in his dream as a match between the New South Wales champion, Trident, and the great Victorian stayer, Commotion.
When the actual race was run, some weeks after the poem appeared in The Bulletin, it was a pyrrhic victory for Paterson’s ‘dream horse’ Trident, who finished fourth, but well ahead of Commotion, who came in 21st in a field of 28 runners.
The result that year would have pleased young Banjo Paterson, however, as the race was won by the New South Wales bred, trained and owned horse, Arsenal.
Even more pleasing to New South Welshmen would have been the fact that Arsenal’s previous owner was a Victorian, Mr W. Pearson, who also owned Commotion.
Pearson was a wealthy sportsman who owned a large team of horses in Melbourne and had dreadful luck in attempting to win the Cup. Commotion had finished third behind Martini-Henry in 1883 and second behind Malua in 1884.
Pearson then purchased Arsenal, who was bred at Tocal Stud near Maitland, for 625 guineas. The horse won the VATC Criterion Stakes and performed well in lead-up races to the Cup of 1885, in which the three-year-old was given the featherweight handicap of 6 st 9 lb (42 kg). In spite of all his promise, however, Arsenal ran a shocker in the big race, finishing 31st in a field of 35.
Disgusted with both his poor luck and the horse, Pearson sold Arsenal to Mr W. Gannon, a Sydney racing man, for a mere 375 guineas. Trained by Harry Rayner and ridden by inexperienced jockey W. English, Arsenal won the Cup in 1886, soundly defeating Commotion, carrying the Pearson colours.
The poem, only the third of Paterson’s verses to be published in The Bulletin, also pokes fun at the typical punter’s fear of picking a winner but not being paid. The poet also has some fun with the various old wives’ tales concerning which foods give us restless nights and vivid dreams.
Above all, the poem demonstrates the 22-year-old writer’s enthusiasm for racing.
A DREAM OF THE MELBOURNE CUP
A.B. ‘BANJO’ PATERSON
Bring me a quart of colonial beer
And some doughy damper to make good cheer,
I must make a heavy dinner;
Heavily dine and heavily sup,
Of indigestible things fill up,
Next month they run the Melbourne Cup,
And I have to dream the winner.
Stoke it in, boys! the half-cooked ham,
The rich ragout and the charming cham.
I’ve got to mix my liquor;
Give me a gander’s gaunt hind leg,
Hard and tough as a wooden peg,
And I’ll keep it down with a hard-boiled egg,
’Twill make me dream the quicker.
Now I am full of fearful feed,
Now I may dream a race indeed,
In my restless, troubled slumber;
While the night-mares race through my heated brain
And their devil-riders spur amain,
The tip for the Cup will reward my pain,
And I’ll spot the winning number.
Thousands and thousands and thousands more,
Like sands on the white Pacific shore,
The crowding people cluster;
For evermore it’s the story old,
While races are bought and backers are sold,
Drawn by the greed of the gain of gold,
In their thousands still they muster.
***
And the bookies’ cries grow fierce and hot,
‘I’ll lay the Cup! The double, if not!’
‘Five monkeys, Little John, sir!’
‘Here’s fives bar one, I lay, I lay!’
And stick to the game that is sure to pay,
While fools put money on, sir!
And now in my dream I seem to go
And bet with a ‘book’ that I seem to know—
A Hebrew money-lender;
A million to five is the price I get—
Not bad! but before I book the bet
The horse’s name I clean forget,
Its number and even gender.
Now for the start, and here they come,
And the hoof-strokes roar like a mighty drum
Beat by a hand unsteady;
They come like a rushing, roaring flood,
Hurrah for the speed of the Chester blood;
For Acme is making the pace so good
There are some of ’em done already.
But round the back she begins to tire,
And a mighty shout goes up, ‘Crossfire!’
The magpie jacket’s leading;
And Crossfire challenges, fierce and bold,
And the lead she’ll have and the lead she’ll hold,
But at length gives way to the black and gold,
Which away to the front is speeding.
Carry them on and keep it up—
A flying race is the Melbourne Cup,
You must race and stay to win it;
And old Commotion, Victoria’s pride,
Now takes the lead with his raking stride,
And a mighty roar goes far and wide—
‘There’s only Commotion in it!’
But one draws out from the beaten ruck
And up on the rails by a piece of luck
He comes in a style that’s clever;
‘It’s Trident! Trident! Hurrah for Hales!’
‘Go at ’em now while their courage fails’;
‘Trident! Trident! for New South Wales!’
‘The blue and white for ever!’
Under the whip! with the ears flat back,
Under the whip! though the sinews crack,
