6. slang
an arrangement by which, in any description of sport, every
competitor in a race is supposed to have a chance of winning equal to
the chances of his opponents. HANDICAPPING, in horse-racing signifies
the adjudgment of various weights to horses differing in age, power, and
speed, so as to place them as much as possible on an equality. At other
sports this equalization is managed by means of starts.
The old game of HANDICAP (hand i’ the cap) is a very different affair;
and, as it is now almost obsolete, being only played by gentlemen in
Ireland, after hunting and racing dinners, when the wine has circulated
pretty freely, merits a description here. It is played by three persons,
in the following manner:—A wishes to obtain some article belonging to
B, say a horse; and offers to “challenge” his watch against it. B
agrees; and C is chosen as HANDICAPPER to “make the award”—that is, to
name the sum of money that the owner of the article of lesser value
shall give with it, in exchange for the more valuable one. The three
parties, A, B, and C, put down a certain stake each, and then the
HANDICAPPER makes his award. If A and B are both satisfied with the
award, the exchange is made between the horse and watch, and the
HANDICAPPER wins, and takes up the stakes. Or if neither be satisfied
with the award, the HANDICAPPER takes the stakes; but if A be satisfied
and B not, or _vice versâ_, the party who declares himself satisfied
gets the stakes. It is consequently the object of the HANDICAPPER to
make such award as will cause the challenger and challenged to be of the
same mind; and considerable ingenuity is required and exhibited on his
part. The challenge having been made, as stated, between A’s watch and
B’s horse, each party puts his HAND into a CAP or hat [or into his
pocket] while C makes the award, which he purposely does in as rapid and
complex a manner as possible. Thus, after humorously exaggerating the
various excellences of the articles, he may say—“The owner of the
superior gold lever watch shall give to the owner of the beautiful
thoroughbred bay horse, called Flyaway, the watch and fifteen
half-crowns, seven crowns, eighteen half-guineas, one hundred and forty
groats, thirteen sovereigns, fifty-nine pence, seventeen shillings and
sixty-three farthings. Draw, gentlemen!” A and B must instantly then
draw out and open their hands. If money appears in both, they are
agreed, and the award stands good; if money be in neither hand, they are
also agreed, but the award is rejected. If money be only in one hand,
they are not agreed, the award is off, and the stakes go as already
stated. Very frequently, neither A nor B is sufficiently quick in his
mental calculation to follow the HANDICAPPER, and not knowing on the
instant the total of the various sums in the award, prefers being “off,”
and, therefore, “draws” no money. As in this event the HANDICAPPER gets
the stakes, the reason for the complex nature of his award is obvious.
When HANDICAPPING has once commenced in a convivial party, it is
considered unsportsmanlike to refuse a challenge. So when the small
hours draw on, and the fun becomes fast and furious, coats, boots,
waistcoats, even shirts are challenged, HANDICAPPED, and exchanged,
amidst an almost indescribable scene of good humoured joviality and
stentorian laughter. This is the true HANDICAP. The application of the
term to horse-racing has arisen from one or more persons being chosen to
make the award between persons, who put down equal sums of money, on
entering horses unequal in power and speed for the same race. So that
the HANDICAP has ultimately come to be regarded as an arrangement of a
purely business-like nature, by which means affairs, no matter how much
they may differ in degree, may be arranged satisfactorily by all
parties. The use of the word is spreading rapidly, and it has already a
sense beyond that of mere sporting.
Source: The Slang Dictionary, 1864