THE RUIN OF THE TURF IN NEW ZEALAND.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1226, 22 March 1880, Page 2

THE RUIN OF THE TURF IN NEW ZEALAND.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE OAMARU MAIL. Sir, —In my last letter I dealt with the first portion of your review of my essay, I shall now, with your permission, say a few words about No. 2. The first point considered is whether or not the Turf is worthy of being kept up, whether " the gam© is worth the candle." That, sir, is a point beyond my province to go into. I, in common with all sportsmen, hold that the Turf is the grandest, of our national institutions. Others, who are not sportsmen, may hold other views. The reviewer of my essay admits " that without the means of betting largely, owners cannot afford to keep up their stables and pay for training, &c.but he does not see that on this account " the sport would cease to exist." He opines that a far higher moral tone would prevail were bookmakers swept away, and is confident that at all events horse-racing would still continue " if there were not a single bookmaker in the land." Now, sir, admitting that owners must betlargely, with whom are they to bet if the. ring be abolished ? The reviewer fehera apparently afraid that he has admitted) too much, and so he retracts, awd says heis u not convinced that by betting aloneowners are enabled to maintain their stables." I thought I had made that point clear enough at all events in my essay. I am, however, asked to show " how the thing is worked," instead of leaving my reader to " grope his way in the dark to a conclusion." I must confess that the reviewer is very much in the dark indeed. The cases he supposes are, from a turf view, impossibilities. Wo are asked to imagine that twenty owners take 1000 to 60 each about their respective horses' chances. Setting aside the utter unlikelihood of twenty owners wishing to do anything so foolish, how, in the name of all that's absurd, could all the horses be at the same price 1 As soon asi ever the acceptances appeared, the odda against each of the twenty animals would be regulated by the public fancy, and would vary from, say, 1000 to 15 to 100Q to 300. Suppose that Brown, Jones, Smithers, &c., own these same twenty horses. Brown thinks he knows what horse will win; so does Jones; so does Smithers. Brown, Jones, and Smithers make their bets accordingly. Any one else may do the same thing. The osl|y advantage an owner possesses is in ing his own horse's chance pretty accu-i rately and in being able to fowft a better idea of the other horses 1 chances thpA most-other persons. He would nevejf bft such a fool as tot back his own horse in every race, and yet it is on this hypothesis that rny yeviewer argues. Nor is there the slightest neoessity to pre-suppose collusion on the part of owners. They merely back their opinion like overdone else. If they now arid then know a little more than other people, that is the only advantage they have, and on© they aro fairly entitled to. As throwing some light on " how the thing is worked," and as displaying the di(ferenoethat exists between the the morality of the turf and the morality of the Sunday School, let me mention a vwy common [ case. Brown enters a howe a handicap, is satisfied with the weight allotted, and determines tc back his hoyse. To hia disgust he fttida hicftself anticipated. The publiq fancies his animal and piles ita imoney on him. Brown, who expected to get, say, LIOOO, so finds that the weight of public money has brought hia horse up to 1000—400. "What is Brown to do 1 } Run his horse for ths publio profit, and (if he wins) incw a penalty for the next handicap, or scratch him and let the publie pay for its greed aud haste. Being a man. o| sense, he does forthwith scratch his animal, and backs something else., immediately there is a howl from the public, Every little « sporting owlet"

gcreams his " hoot, hoot" at poor Brown, who has, after all, done nothing worse th«n decline to fill other people's pockets. I coald adduce numberless other cases which the public chooses to regard as being more or less " swindles," but which from a "turf' point of view are quite justifiable. Any attempt, in fact, to deprive the public of " cheap racing" is from the public standpoint a swindle. In conclusion, and at the risk of appearing as a special pleader, I must say that I think the reviewer is too severe on the ring. For my part I would trust a bookmaker just as far as a stockbroker ; and, at worst, he does wot prey on the widow and the orphan.—l am, Sir, Kotoiorf. Dunedin, 19th March, 1880. TO THE EDITOR OT THE OAM ABC MAIL. Sir,—" Weka" writes again this morning with touching concern about my stjle of language. "Will he be surprised to hear that it is langnage very generally used, not only in Oamaru but elsewhere, wherever systematic vilification of private and public society has to be punished. In such cases superfine writing 13 not the weapon to use. the malignant and •envious scribblers have rendered themselves Aon tit iti Iwtf and, as outlaws of society, society U3es in their condemnation unusual but strictly necessary epithets. Let "Weka," which, I believe, is the native name for " wood-hen," come with his chef out from his secluded haunts amid the gorse and bracken to mingle in the busy scenes of man, and he will be improved in mind and become more charitable to and hopeful of the doing 3 of society. Poor little wood-hen, thy mission is not as thou suggested to improve society; rather first of all do thou, little short wing, improve thself.—l am, Sir, Paterfamilias. Oamaru, March 20,1880.