HANLAN AND COURTNEY.

Globe, Volume XXI, Issue 1814, 13 December 1879, Page 3

HANLAN AND COURTNEY.

With regard to the Hanlan and Courtney match, the latest number the “Turf, Field and Farm ” has the fallowing : All sorts of wild rumors are afloat around tho city as wo go to press regarding the much-advertised meeting of the two famous oarsmen.

The latest telegraph reports state that either last night or early this morning some unknown parties entered, the boathouse and demolished both of Courtney’s boats by sawing them in twain. How this could have happened is a mystery, for it is sa : d the house and boats were jealously guarded night and day. Robert Larmon and Burt Brown first dis covered the water gate partly opened, and the hook that had been nailed by Courtuey on going to supper, was forced up, the apartment between the doors being wide enough for an oar to pass through. Courtney's practice shell was cut through entirely in half, six feet four inches from the stern being sawn in an oblique line, deviating two-thirds of an inch from a right angle with the linos of the boat, and the racing shell in which ho intended to row had also been sawn twelve feet two inches from the bow to a depth of one-third of the pull. The line of the cut being of an oblique or nearly two inches in the line of the boat. A saw belonging to the boathouse was found lying in the water of the well. Later despatches stated that referee Blaikie would decide that if Hanlan rows over the course at the time specified in the articles of agreement he can claim the purse. Hanlan’s friends thought that he would endeavor to make the best time on record. The grand stand fell to pieces this morning, with but four or five ladies on it. No one was hurt.

The match, it appears, fell through, r.ad in this connection the following telegram appears in the “San Francisco Chronicle”— Toronto, October 23. Hanlan, in accepting the proposition of Blaikio for a race with Courteney, in view of the unsatisfactory and unprofitable conclusion of the recent match, says :—“I do not believe that Courtney wishes to enter into a fair and square contest with me, and I have no wish, if I take the time and trouble to get ready for a race, to ha deprived of my earnings, either by fraud nr cowardice. I am of the opinion that if this contest he made subject to the condition of Courtuev’a coming out on the water and rowing mo a fair race, it will never come oil; but if the money be placed in your hands for a play-or-pay race upon a certain date, or the first day thereafter when smooth water can be had, I think that I can win with less trouble in that way than through a lawsuit. Let the race be play or pay, and if anybody cuts my boats, Courtney can have the money.” Hanlan will not re-visit England for the present, but will allow Elliott or Boyd 500 dollars expenses to row at Toronto for 1000 or 1500 dollars aside,