J. H. RILEY AND WALLACE ROSS, FOR £240.

Globe, Volume XXII, Issue 1832, 6 January 1880, Page 3

J. H. RILEY AND WALLACE ROSS, FOR £240.

£“ Turf, Field, and Farm.”]

James H. Riley, of Saratoga, N.Y., and Wallace Boss, of St. John, N. 8., sculled three miles with a turn on the Thames, at Norwich, Conn., on October 20fcb, for tho sum of 500dol. a-side, to which was added 200dol, contributed by the inhabitants of Norwich. The water, under the influence of a northwesterly wind, was rather lumpy, but still tho conditions could not bo called unfavourable. Many thousands of people witnessed the contest, and great enthusiasm was displayed. Riley was slightly the favourite, but there was not so much speculation as could have been expected. There were no fewer than six judges—two in the accompanying steamboat, two at the turning point, and two at tho finish, whilst Mr Eldridge 0. Cook officiated ns referee. At 3.40 p.m., nearly an hour late, the men sat in their boats ready for the start. Fire minutes later tho men went away at tho word, Boss pulling 42 to the minute and taking tho lead nearly a length in the first quarter mile Riley was up to 34 only, but his stroke was a telling one. At the end of the half-mile, where the river turns slightly westward, the boats wore well together. Boss struck sharp across the corner, but his opponent preferred a position nearer tho channel, for the benefit of tho current. From the judge’s boat, which was further to tho rear than was pleasant, the men could bo seen nearing each other, Boss dropping back a trifle, and both pulling 34 to the minute. Tho mile showed Riley’s boat shutting in on the other, and he took a course for the lower stake-boat, which was worth half a dozen lengths, but both went too far to the westward, and made the race 15sac slower than it ought to have been. In dmin 15seo from the start Riley turned his stake-boat, end three seconds later Boss swung handsomely around his. One hundred yards from the turn any doubts of Riley’s victory that might have been entertained vanished into the air. He had two lengths of clear water the best of it, and was by no means forced to his best work, but he kept bettering hia lead, when he shot past the judges’boat with four good lengths lead, and a scant mile to go. His face bore a triumphant smite when he nodded to the chesring crowd. Thence home he dropped to a 28 stroke, doing nothing more than to keep hi* lead undiminished. Riley hugged the east shore in quiet water until just at the mouth of the Shetucket, when ho shot across and finished an easy winner by two lengths. Ross spurted up to 40 at tho last six or eight hundred feet, but was too late, for Riley responded handsomely. The official time is, starting time, 3h 45min p.m.; finish, 4h Bmin 26isec. J. H. Riley, who is a native of Saratoga, aged thirty-three, has a good record. In his first race at Saratoga Lake, in August, 1874, two miles, he was second to Courtney, in 14min. The same month he won the first of three heats of a mile and a half race in 9min 24Jsec. In August, 1876, he won the Champion Amateur Silver Cup at Saratoga, two miles, ia 13min 3) a sec. Riley was declared the winner in the three-mile race at Greenwood Lake, in September, 1877, Courtney not sppsaring, and the same year he lost a three mile race to Courtney on Saratoga Lake. Johnson beat him in two races in the summer of 1878, but this year he was more fortunate. In August he won a race at Pittsburg, three miles, time, 20min 57sec, with Plaisted, Johnson, and others against him, and last month, at Barre, Ont., on a threemile course, rowed a dead heat with Hanlan. The latter refused the decisive heat, and Riley was awarded the first money. Ross is declared to be left without money by the result of tho race, and 50 dollars wore collected for him.