year with May-Day-probably from the commencement of the present century to the hour in which the practice was revised-the Derby was bonâ fide a four-year-old stakes. Since then the four-year-olds have been the exception, not the rule. Such was the chaos of its policy, when the handicap arose a demoniacal dilemma, wherein "the race is not to the swift," but to the wise in their generation; and the battle an onslaught wherein "Greek meets Greek. How long shall conditions such as these outrage thy gracious code, O immutable progress?......

THE RING.

"Sans foi: ni loi."

The circle known to every race-course in the kingdom under the title of The Ring, is obscure in the matter of its chronology, Some authorities assign it an origin contemporary with those celebrated stakes, the Derby, Oaks, and St. Leger; and that epoch will serve our purpose as well as any other. But betting as a business was a very different kind of thing then, and for more than half a century after, compared with that which it has now become. There is indeed an exceedingly shocking instance of the principle of wagering upon "the double event," related of the good old times. Somewhere towards the end of the last century, one Tregonwell Frampton had a celebrated horse, with which he won a great race. Thereupon he laid a wager that he would cut a piece off the animal, and perform the same feat again with him on the morrow-and he did it! But perhaps such tidings had better not be bequeathed to posterity.

The proper Olympiad of the "legs" may be laid as commencing with the present century-some few years before Dan Dawson was hanged! verb. sap. The reader will pardon the pendent, and ascribe it to the truculent influence of that allusion to horrid old Tregonwell Frampton Now this Dawson, whose end by a halter was so ominously characteristic, was a tout," or hanger-on, of the training-stables at Newmarket. The Ring, having begun to operate in earnest, certain of its members, it was said indeed, sworn to solemnly-employed him to poison certain horses belonging to Lord Foley and other turf celebrities, which Dan "accordingly" did, and paid the penalty with his life, like a hero of the classic age. He died, and made no sign. Thereupon his principals came out with renewed confidence and enterprise. They became persons of account. One of them, indeed, was but recently removed from this sublunary scene-whither we will not speculate. The morale of the man is not to be told in words: his physique gave you the idea of a Ghoul and a Thug in combination. By such as this compound, and his fellows, was the circle at issue instituted. The Ring has become the most remarkable financial fact that ever concerned commerce. It is a system impersonating the philosopher's stone, and a principle suited (especially) to the meanest capacity. Not only is it convenient, but rather it is essential, that all who adopt it professionally should be penniless-wholly without funds, or tangible resources of any kind. Carrying on the war in this way, without "impediment" of any

description, should the essay miscarry the essayist is only where he was: should he succeed, the supplies would be superfluous......

I cannot collect, from out all the instances of my experience, the case of a professed leg, who ultimately achieved eminence and wealth, in which the adventurer started with a penny in his pocket. The rule may, indeed, have its exceptions; but I am not cognizant of them. To this want of means, where great success followed, there was generally added absence of all principle, and almost universally very repulsive personal accompaniments. Those who have been familiar with the turf any time within the last quarter of a century, will not require evidence of these premises; and those who have not had such acquaintance with it would not be assisted to a conclusion did I name my witnesses. And it is these frank archers who, having robbed Peter, we are assured are the only sources to which Paul can look for payment. Without the ring, asks Captain Rous, "where would gentlemen find facilities for hedging their stakes; for backing their horses; for reducing their charges?" With all acknowledgment of his honourable observance of the practice, and finished skill in the science of the course, I must take leave to question his logic in the matter of ring finance. The members of that ilk bet" for their living," as labour-language conventionally describes the object of operative industry; and so to do they must live to bet. Not one of the professionals of any "account" spends less, perhaps, than a thousand a-year-travelling expenses and other et cetera included. This must all come-or all have come at one time or other— out of the funds of the turf. It is not to be argued in opposition to this dilemma, "Nevertheless, the turf must have its two estates-its racing and its betting," seeing that, were the profession hors de combat tomorrow, there still would remain enough of speculators, and the same amount of speculative capital, plus the aforesaid deductions for living, expenses, and so forth, as at present. Not a moiety of those who constitute what is called the "racing circles" are proprietors of racing establishments. There are gentlemen who wager as zealously and as promiscuously as "Mr. Davies," and with this peculiarity in their dealing especially suited to set customers at their ease-that they do so in the foreknowledge and conviction of being the losers......

66

Not many weeks ago I encountered-no matter where I pledge myself, however, that the incident is fact-a certain sporting member of— we won't say which of the Houses-for the last dozen years as well known to the ring at Newmarket, as was Crockford, or Jim Bland "lucus a non--" He has a peculiarity of speech-but we must not be too identical...... I've had a book upon the Derby every year since I left Cambridge," he observed, "and lost pretty well on them all; but last year, annus mirabilis, when all the world was exchanging embraces in the Great Exhibition, as prizefighters shake hands before they begin," ('tis all I can do to keep clear of the recitative in which he delivered himself: with one touch of this pen I could make the reader cry out, "By Jove! that's") "I lost as much as in the whole boiling put together, or thereabouts:" and putting his hand into the pectoral pocket of an extremely orthodox brown coat (I won't tell you whether it had or had not the Jockey Club button), and exposing the balance-leaf of a little purple morocco volume, he said, "What do you

think of that?" According to the figures he was a winner of £1,500; according to the facts he had not received sixpence, but per contra, was a loser of £800-cash, being the precise sum to which he had hedged, for the purpose of making himself "safe!"..... Politenessa pis aller on such occasions-prompted me to comment, "Well! better luck another time." I shall never forget the exstacy of disgust with which he took this dose of soothing syrup. "To be sure, there's a good time coming here it is!" he replied, turning over the page, and pointing on its reverse to certain hieroglyphics, "O! of course-you may there perceive that I took £12,000 to £2,000 of about Grecian for the Derby, in the beginning of the year. I say I took's £12,000 to £2,000-what do you remark on that?" Here he pinched my arm in the paroxysm of his emphasis-"I took all that money of ; I did, damn me if I didn't!" he repeated in solemn intervals, "and if it had come off right, I should never have touched as much as would pay toll for this walking-stick. He drew me the Tuesday after the race, of my two thousand, and, to the best of my belief, every dump of it had disappeared in whitebait, before Ascot." It is possible I might have tried another " 'go" of the syrup, but he relieved me of my perplexity by inquiring, "I suppose there's nothing doing at Tattersall's just yet?"......

Whether the Jockey Club takes cognizance of bets, or repudiates all interference with them; whether defaulters are excluded from Grand Stands, or admitted within their precincts, in no way affects the system of "play" as parcel of the policy of the turf. If a man can't show, he can operate through a commissioner. The evil and the reproach are in the principle which recognises a contract whose only security lies in the honour of the parties to it-between persons of character and condition, and those who possess neither the one nor the other. Indeed, in many of its social relations, as well as this particular passage of beggar-my-neighbour," that most practical of peoples- the English, displays an extremely bizarre modus of doing business. John Bull might have sat for the proverb of straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel...... May good digestion wait on his confiding appetite!......

66

When the gentleman of England, with a taste for the turf, kept halfa-dozen race-horses for his recreation, then Tattersall's was just the place for a periodical visit, to back his plater. Now that the British noble keeps his team of half a hundred, in good carnest, he wants a wider field of action. His fast work requires supplemental "legs." "legs." Then these must have their helps: entire-hog men-with consciences from pitch-and-toss to wilful murder, inclusive. So, as nobody cared, or dared to suggest a more becoming order of things, up sprung that beau ideal of the "sans foi, ni loi" school, the "list" scheme. As brevity I assume to be the pith of logic, the present status of that institution I take leave to illustrate by an advertisement that I have before me as I write from a dealer in tips," which appeared in Bell's Life of the 18th ult., considerably longer than an average leader in The Times! The reader will very probably smile at the comparison; but it is no subject for mirth. Where does the money come from to pay for advertising on such a scale as this? From ignorance and folly, the seeds of vice and crime. No man of education or discretion incurs danger from

such tissues of brazen effrontery and mendacity as those which now regularly occupy columns of a class of the weekly press, put forth by racing prophets, list-house keepers, et hoc genus omne. But inexperienced age and youth; the service of our household life-servants, porters, shopmen, clerks, become their unresisting prey. And this sad and serious fact is no news to anybody. Every one is sensible of the startling audacity of this desire for promoting and applying plunder ; but nobody takes any trouble about it. Here, in this mighty metropolis, daily, hourly, the merchant, the retail dealer, the dweller in private life, is robbed of his substance to furnish funds for indulgence in one of the most pernicious villanies that ever owed origin to the race of chevaliers d'industrie. Is it, or is it not illegal to institute and carry on establishments for gambling and betting? I cannot, of my own knowledge, dispose of the question; but if City law be sound, why then it is against the statute. The following scene, and its dialogue, relates to a civic meeting which took place in the middle of last month

"At the Great Court of Wardmote, held in the Court of Aldermen, Guildhall, on Monday, the foreman of the inquest of Farringdon Without Ward handed in a presentment which he said related to a subject of great importance in the City of London. There were several gambling and horse-racing betting-houses in the ward, and the mischiefs perpetrated by them were really dreadful.

"Alderman Wilson said the inquest were bound to present the particular houses in which such practices were encouraged. He was perfectly aware that there were numbers of houses of the kind alluded to, in the City, and that servants and boys were frequently ruined by the system of affording facilities of betting from the sum of threepence or fourpence, or even lower, to much larger amounts. The names of the houses must be entered in the presentment, so that a general bill of indictment might be formed, and so formidable a nuisance might be removed. The complaint afforded a proof of the value of the inquest system (hear, hear).

"The gentlemen of the inquest said their sons and servants were in imminent danger from the depraved encouragement given to the vice in such dens of villany.

"Alderman Wire said he had witnessed many melancholy instances of trial for robbery, to which the perpetrators were tempted by the practices of the houses denounced by the inquest.

"A presentment from the parish of St. Bride also complained of swarms of betting-houses; the names of some of which were inserted in the document, but were not read in the court. It was stated that several robberies had been recently committed in the parish, and the proceeds had been spent in the very houses which the inquest pointed out.

"Alderman Wire: The offence is easily dealt with. Consult the Ward Clerk, and let the evidence be got up in such a manner as may supply the City Solicitor with the materials for prosecution, and there can be no doubt as to the result."

Now observe, here is admittance on the part of the City authorities, of their perfect familiarity with the existence of dens of list-thieves round about the Lord Mayor's house. Voilà tout! It was no business of the Lord Mayor's: the aldermen had no mission for a crusade against the "tips:" somebody must make a list of the infernal machines and consult with the "Ward Clerk," and get up the evidence in such a manner as to supply the City Solicitor with materials for a prosecution...... What's the Ward Clerk that he don't do it himself? Is he

ignorant of the whereabouts of public-houses that now draw lists as openly as they draw beer? Is it not as notorious as Bow Church, that within sound of its proverbial chimes stands the eastern Tattersall's? That the newspapers quote the state of the odds at "Beeton's" as methodically as the condition of the market at Hyde Park Corner? Does the Ward Clerk ever read the journals, and had he not ever the curiosity to inquire the meaning of such paragraphs-At Beeton's, on such-and-such a day, such-and-such horses were quoted at such-and-such odds?

If the intention to deal with the crying evil of turf-gambling, as announced on the part of an individual understood to possess the power to treat it effectually in its strongholds in the City of London, be founded on right principle-that of annihilating it as a fact fraught with great social mischief—a service imperatively required at the hands of those that alone can accomplish it, will be done. But if it be designed to sweep away the miscellaneous malefactors with the view to secure a monopoly of the rich traffic in fools for the licensed victuallers and proprietors of public-houses in the metropolis, why it will only be adding fresh insult to existing injury. If the thing be wrong actually, it cannot be made right agentively. If there be a law against it, the legal penalty must equally operate against publicans and sinners-not having licenses: acts of parliament do not recognise dispensations. But such, it is suggested, is your civic philosophy. "That in the captain's but a choleric word," which spoken by rank and file becomes blasphemy...... Let us hope that the spirit of progress which is abroad may provide a remedy for this, and all such as this; and let us honestly and honourably aid the issue. This is a time of jeopardy for the turf: let us bear in mind "if its parts are incongruous and antagonistic, its hour of trial is that of dissolution"......

PROGRESS OF THE WINTER EXHIBITION, 1851-52.

BY SCRIBBLE.

I know no class of writers in the same unfortunate position as contributors to sporting literature. No class of writing is so open to criticism, so liable to censure; and for this reason-we write on a subject upon which every jackanapes considers himself capable of giving an opinion. You write a novel: no one can impeach your facts, though they may fall foul of your style: you may give reins to your imagination, though your language may be intolerable: you attempt to decipher some cuneiform writing, and impose a long dissertation upon the public on Assyrian character-who is to find fault with you? who is to gainsay your erudition? No one: you are far beyond all criticism. No one: unless we except the gentleman who lately attempted to review a work of this kind, and only copied the inscriptions upside down. If you wish for a difficulty in the paths of literature, eschew Layard; do not edite a Greek play; tackle not Professor Wilson on Sanscrit; and trouble yourself not with the gene