himself!" This is a “stunner," at all events, if it's not absolutely original. At Lincoln, as at other places last year, the stewards appear to have decided on unprofessional grounds. This certainly was the fact as regards the Selling Stakes, according to the custom of the turf, seeing that the starter declared to them that it was a start, both flags being down. In face of this declaration, the question of start or no start? has been referred to the stewards of the Jockey Club. Upon what grounds will they determine this vexata quæstio? I know of no authority in racing law applicable to it. The Forty Rules of Horse Racing in General" make no provision for it. The Newmarket rules take no cognizance of it; but in Captain Rous's little volume on "The Laws and Practice of Horse Racing," the gallant author-and authority, as a most practical turfite-says, "The decision of the starter is final."...I think all this indefinite definition "a heavy blow and a great discouragement" to the turf. It cannot be supposed to remain thus unsettled, looking at the enormous amount of capital involved in racing now. The only Jockey Club law upon the point of the starter's official power, is to the following effect....... After reciting the peculiar duties required of him at Newmarket, the Code Olympique, says, "The person appointed to start the horses has authority to order the jockeys to draw up in a line as far behind the starting post as he may think necessary; and any jockey disobeying the orders of the starter, or taking any unfair advantage, shall be liable to be fined in such sum not exceeding £5, as the stewards of the Jockey Club may think fit to inflict."...... Suppose the starter at Newmarket should "think it necessary" to order the field for the Two Thousand "to draw up in a line" at Trumpington, would no appeal lie? Until some better plan be devised, and some better arrangement provided, it would save disputes, at all events, if to the announcement of all race meetings given in the Book and Sheet Calendars there was added the especial clause, "That all questions of law or policy connected with the running should be at the optional disposal of the stewards, and that their decision should be final." As all engagements would be made with the understanding that they would be affected by this condition, nobody would be entitled to object against it, and it really is needed. Imagine stewards being compelled to submit to such a bamboozle as this: scene, The Fylde......." We understand the winner of the last race, the Selling Stakes, is a leader in one of the Kirkham omnibuses, and was hired by the committee to run in this race for two sovereigns." To this stake there were thirty pounds of public money added, which we consider a really handsome bonus at Newmarket. The acceptances for the spring handicaps are out; and, according to authentic advertisements in all the sporting papers, you may buy the winners of the whole batch for half-a-crown-"no winners, no money!" What havoc those vagabonds must be doing among the tills of the shopocracy and the "pewter" of the aristocracy! They say half the "spouts" in the West End are bunged up with spoons. If you want a sample of the style of your "betting office" in 1852, just stroll down Piccadilly, and examine one or two of them. Has Mr. Owen Jones been the decorator ?...The Alhambra was never got up finer with scarlet and gold than a "bank” hard by St. James's-street. And, apropos, how is it that some of the first banking firms in London allow their establishments to be baits for the public gudgeons? One" club" advises its customers that it places"all monies" in the "London and Westminster Bank," St. James's Square, where all deposits shall remain in the bank untouched, and be removed on no grounds whatever until the period of their re-distribution on the decision of the results about which they are invested." Another "tippery" hails from Ransom's; and a "commission office" announces "all money staked deposited in the London and Westminster Bank," without indicating what "branch" of it. Whole sides of the newspapers are occupied by the most flagrant swindles that ever sought victims through the channels of public advertisements. They bent the railway schemes, of immortal memory, by any odds-Sirius to a lucifer. Apropos des bottes, what fun it must be for the old "fisher of souls!" How he must wag his tail at the provision that is making for his nets! What a study pages occupied by such desperate outrages on common sense, by statements that challenge the disgust of any human being claiming to be accounted sane, furnish for the philosopher of life-the practical sage whose premises are sound facts! How often do they remind me of the answer I once got from a monkey-faced shaver at Shoreham, into whose shop curiosity drew me, while my horses had their mouths washed out, as I journeyed from Goodwood to Brighton. His shop, which was the size of a sentry-box, was bedizened with all the colours of the rainbow, and labelled with a catalogue of oils and essences to be had within, that would grow crops of curls upon churchyard skulls, and bid Fleet-ditch flow with eau-de-Cologne..." Figaro," said I," who do you think will swallow gammon like that?" Nineteen out of every twenty that bite," said he, with a chuckle..." saving your presence, I haven't the honour of knowing where you live; but I should like to hear, for one man of sense, how many fools pass by your house in the twenty-four hours"... Whether the alchemist of old failed or succeeded in his scheme, the philosopher's stone is in possession of the modern "leg." The cabala is expressed by the two letters p. p. These constitute the motive power of the mighty machinery of the Ring; the engine is called Round Betting. Its fashion of working is in this wise it repudiates-upon principle the commonplace conditions of the old-fashioned compact which supposed-or assumed-that both parties, or all parties to it, had some probable or possible beneficial contingency. The ring recognizes nothing of the sort. Its operations are not confined to a transmutation of metals; it deals with bodies of other descriptions. For instance, that of the horse enters very generally into its experiments. Thus A wagers with B, we will suppose, against the favourite for the Derby; he bets him £30,000 to £10,000, that is to say, at the rate of 3 to 1, that The Greek don't win; this, of course, is put figuratively. When he has booked the bet, it is the same as if he had presented a cheque at a banker's where there were funds to clear it. The question is simply"How will you take it?" Perhaps he makes up his mind to buy the horse does so--and instead of sending him to Epsom, rusticates him for the nonce among the shades of Leatherhead. Perhaps he says to the owner-" I can afford to lay you £5,000 even that you win." "That will answer my book," reflects the proprietor: "I'll hedge what I stand-and by losing the Derby, I shall get long odds about him for the Leger. Done: I'll take you." Or, peradventure, he may reason in this way: "After all, there's no use throwing away money. I'll let Armstrong, who is to ride, lay me a thousand that he loses." What sort of a contract betting is will best be understood by this simple fact: the " public," as the non-professional speculators are called, are the backers of horses. How say you, gentlemen-do you find for or against the million in this action? The million is cast in damages and costs. The scale of weights seems to give more satisfaction this season than it did in 1851. It certainly reads more even. Looking at it in its columnar arrangement, the eye detects but few obvious discrepancies. One or two there are, as-Constantine, 4st. 10lb. for the Chester Cup, and 5st. 10lb. for the Newmarket Handicap; Haresfoot, 6st. 10lb. at Chester, and 5st. 12lb. for the Flying Dutchman's handicap; Grand Duke, 6st. 6lb. at Chester, 7st. 5lb. at Newmarket--and the like, "sed ubi plura nitent' it would be ungracious to find fault with a few slips of the pound. The entries to these Spring-traps are a high average. For the mighty-I had almost said almighty-Chester Cup (crater would be its more appropriate title), there are one hundred and thirty acceptances! The whole world couldn't supply them with jockeys-at the weight. Twenty per cent. upon the lot would choke the running ground. Then give one rapid thought-it won't bear reflection-to the money, the mint, the diggings," that will change hands upon the issue! Imagine the banks that will explode, the "tips" it will eonsign to the unmentionable place-the heartquake contingent upon its catastrophe! Go sup upon a debauch of roast pork, and dream of the future of its false prophets. 66 The feature for the weight for worth races this year, is the tender burdens that are imposed. Light weights will no doubt make heavy fields-but who is to ride? The four events now out show a wilderness of five and four stone appropriations. I confess that it neither gratifies my humanity nor my taste to see a set of children toiling and tumbling through two miles of miserable encounter, such as the Chester Cup, for instance, involves. As to an exciting finish-the only excitement in such sets-to is that provoked by the fear of one half of the miserable little wretches falling off. But what's the odds"-but the odds? Money makes the mare and the foal, the man and the manikin, go. At the rate the rage for low handicaps progresses, it might be no bad speculation to look out a good cross for General Tom Thumb, and bespeak the stock in time. Even steeple chases are looking down, as regards their loads. The average can hardly be quoted over ten stoneunquestionably "a great blessing" to the animals doomed to that most unsporting of all sporting inventions-a hunter's handicap-but it robs the issue of its real character. It is essentially becoming racing over enclosures. Race horses are taken from the course and made steeplechasers, if there is any "jump" in them. Jockeys have succeeded to the gentlemen's seats, and the trade" monopolises all the business. As a climax, the lists patronise them eminently; the good time of the pigskin has come. Thus runs the world away"-some with the hope of success, others with its assurance made doubly sure. One of the "tips" calls the turf "the gold diggings without toil or danger."... With the month upon which we have entered its season commences-in 66 earnest... Its bill of fare offers some half-dozen meetings of good account, as Catterick Bridge, for instance. For the nonce, however, there is nothing for the turfite but theory, and of that there is enough, and to spare. The best element of it is the promised reduction of racing charges. These have long been an intolerable tax upon owners of studs. Not only in amount were they past all patience, but the manner of their working was a mockery as well as a snare. Imagine inflicting a fine upon every blacksmith who should plate a racer! Did this come out of Vulcan's pocket? He stuck it on somebody or something else and such was the principle pervading all the service. The per centage exacted for receiving the necessary funds, is of a similar policy; fees payable for holding the deposits for stakes and nominations! Who gets the enormous profits derived from the scales at the "reat courses? Fields are weighed out by hundreds, and all is cash on the nail! And then how artistically it is done; half a guinea for weights and scales, in ordinary, and a guinea from the winner! Down they come upon capital after the fashion of the income-tax. But it is as a whole that our Great National Sport shows itself a myth-whose morale is past finding out: as a riddle that no son of man may read. Look at the Chester Cup-that model of a handicap-the specific for putting horses of all classes and conditions on equal terms, with one of its nominations already backed eagerly at 17 to 1, while 100 to 1 goes a-begging about scores of others! It may serve the interest of such as it concerns to hint that the state of the market at Tattersall's, in relation to the amount and character of business done, must no longer be regarded as any criterion of the spirit or the letter of the odds. The immense traffic carried on at the list houses absorbs a large share of the money cireulated in betting. The commissions formerly sent for execution to Hyde Park Corner have resolved themselves into advances paid for tickets at the betting "clubs" and " banks," while "Mr. Davies," the leviathan, swallows the "little fish" by the shoal. Speculation, peculation, knavery, foolery, spoilers and their prey, abound beyond all precedent in the annals of horse-racing. I confess I calculate on healthier times. I do not despair of seeing it once more return to its right purpose, that of a characteristic and a chivalrous sport. This gambling fever must presently wear itself out-and a considerable proportion of its patients also. List to the posy of this eccentric paper, ye men of more brandy than brains! and in lieu of "hock and soda-water" imbibe a draught of that "Pierian spring," flowing from the philosophy of the bard of Avon....... "Blest are they Whose blood and judgment are so well commingled, To sound what stop she pleases." THE UNSUCCESSFUL MAN; ок, PASSAGES IN THE LIFE OF TILBURY NOGO, ESQ. BY FOXGLove. CHAP. XVII. "I prithee go and get me some repast, I care not what, so it be wholesome food- TAMING OF THE SHREW. "Why need my tongue the issue tell? "I don't care-I can't help thinking you made too much use of the old horse. I begged of you upon no account to come till the finish; and hang me! if you didn't make strong running the whole way round!" Such was the expostulation addressed to me by the disappointed owner of the beaten "Saraband," as we sat in juxta-position at the ordinary-table, and waited sulkily for our dinner on the afternoon of the race. As in its kitchen arrangements, the "Green Dragon" at Weatherby was like the "Green Dragon" everywhere else—profuse in its promises, and lavish in its bill of fare, but provokingly dilatory in the production of those dishes it set forth so vauntingly, I cannot better employ the interval which elapsed between our sitting down to a long table, covered for an ordinary of some twenty or thirty guests, the majority of whom were even now impatiently beginning upon dry bread, and the welcome appearance of the first tureen of mock-turtle, borne by a perspiring waiter in Berlin gloves, than by describing the proceedings of that eventful day, which led to the ungracious remark from Squire Topthorne recorded above. The instant the flag was dropped I have already said Saraband started away with a bound, like that of a stricken deer; and for a few awful moments I felt utterly powerless to control, or even guide the tearing brute. With the small muscular strength I naturally possessed reduced by inanition; with knotted reins, shortened stirrups, and a saddle the size of a dessert-plate, all my preconceived notions as to horsemanship, all the practice I had acquired in the hunting-field, were utterly unavailable. Pulled over his withers by his awkward "boring" ways; only saved from being unhorsed by the comparative smoothness of a thorough-bred one's stride; dizzy from the terrific rapidity of the pace, I was confused and helpless as a child. Luckily for me, however, the course for the first half-mile was perfectly straight, nearly as |