at races, I should be quite alarmed at a contrary doctrine.-It is a mere sporting question, which I dare say the gentleman here (Mr. Benson) can answer.

Mr. Benson-If the question had been left to the turf, every man of honour would have decided it immediately.

George Wilden-Groom to Sir T. S. M. Stanley, attended with the filly at Chester Races, 1813 it was a chesnut filly by Archduke, out of a Marske mare. The jockey was weighed, mounted, and was started by Mr. Jackson.-It was not necessary, however, he thought, to ride over the course.-It was sufficient for a horse to appear on the ground.

Chief Justice. dare say the witness has laid down the law of the subject quite correct.

Mr. Thomas Jackson-the Clerk of the Course, said he recollected the filly coming to the post.-The Jockey was mounted, and rode the distance, about three quarters of a mile.

The Attorney-General, for the defendant said, that the case which he had put, had been decided against by the Bench; but he thought it proper to say, that his client would go out of Court with clean hands and without having his honour in the slightest degree doubted. From the first of the business to the last, he had offered over and over again to refer the affair to any gentleman of respectability. But the plaintiff had preferred bringing the matter into Court. He(the Attorney-General) had no witness to call on the behalf of his client.

Verdict-For plaintiff, damages

501.

Chief Justice.-Gentlemen of the

(Continued from page 202.)

N my last I gave pugilism, the IN lead, as the reigning topic of fashionable pre-eminence; perhaps you may have thought my remarks too diffuse I shall now endeavour at more brevity and variety upon other points under observation.

Though the manly and healthful game of rackets has long been the standing dish of amusement within these walls, for those who have strength and agility to take such exercise, we are by no means destitute of other fashionable amusements, beside boxing, to fill up the measure of our lingering time.

Don't imagine you have all the foot-racing and match-walking in Hyde-park or the Edgeware-road, or on the other fashionable prize grounds round the metropolis. We have, I assure yon, our rival pedestrians, and even our cricketers, within our walls, and well contested matches frequently take place. We are, to be sure, rather too limited in our area, for barouchedriving or trotting-matches, though it has been in discussion, whether a poney or an ass-race, somewhat like that at Astley's, might not he adopted with much sport. Beside, it would keep the men of the turf (not scarce in our colony) in spirits for betting, and alive to the recollection of Epsom, Ascot, York, and Newmarket. There are bloods here, in durance for a few hundreds

to

to their tailors or gig-builders, who spend every quarter nearly the amount of their debts, and would at any time stake a wager between two black beetles. There are, how ever, objections with the higher powers to such privileges in a prison; yet it is something astonishing, that the liberties of the grand parole, the rules of this prison, have not yet distinguished the roads through the Champs de St. George, with any of those trotting, cantering, or driving matches, that enliven other fashionable purlieus of the metropolis, though there are frequently whips of the first dash sojourning for their health amongst

us.

Rackets and cricket are the leading games within doors, in both of which many an agile performer frequently displays his skill, and matches are frequently attended by spectators from within doors, to witness those popular sports within the walls of a prison, in which a first-rate blood has made a conspicuous figure.

Beside these species of morning amusements, there is a stupid game called bumble-puppy. It is played with leaden balls, bowled upon a wooden frame formed like a large dish, numbered in compartments from one to nine. Of these frames there are three, and they are constantly occupied all day, with little intermission. They serve to murder the idle hours, and drive away the reflections of a certain class of prisoners, who cannot devote their minds to any thing else. It is by no means uncommon to see the furniture and apparel of a distressed debtor brought to be bowled for by subscription, on these match ings; and thus a temporary supply is obtained to prolong the existence of a few wretched individuals, at

the expence of their bedding and all the little comforts and conveniences of their dreary apartments. A mississippi and two or three billiard tables, and a pine-pin ground, with cards in almost every apartment, constitute the day diver sions of the Benchers.

The aristocracy amuse their afternoons in fine weather, by traversing the Promenade, sometimes accompanied by good natured cher ami's, who, not unmindful of former favours, and perhaps avaricious of more, scruple not to quit the gay rounds of cyprian riot in the hundreds of Soho and Mary-le-bone, to visit their old admirers in durance. A celebrated dash from Coventry, during his sojournment among us, was often attended by half-a-dozen Lady Godiva's of this class, and strutted the parade like a game-cock with a whole flock of fair pullets in his train.

I assure you, in the fine forenoons, we have had frequently a show of these Macaws here, that, for figure and plumage, would not discredit the fashionable promenade in Kensington Gardens. Nor have we wanted, upon those occasions, a proportionate display of Bondstreet loungers, and of that class of dismounted cavalry, your booted pedestrians, who, caparisoned in their jockey frocks and doe-skins, and whipped and spurred for the manege, you would swear had just dismounted from a canter in Rottenrow, did you not know that the gates of this garrison had for years opposed insurmountable obstacles to their excursions.

The amusements of the evening are of a different kind, and serve to beguile reflection with those who have no taste for reading, and no fund for conversation. In the coffee-house, which is furnished

with the morning and evening newspapers, there is also a smoak ing room, every night filled with puffers of the Virginian plant, who, enveloped like gods in clouds of their own creation, unite the influence of tobacco and porter to blunt the acumen of their feeling, and shed a temporary oblivion on the causes of their sadness. Once or twice a week the guests resolve themselves into a singing-club, and the room is usually crowded to excess with amateurs, who come to hear the Braham's and Incledon's of Ellenborough Favilion,

“Pour their soft music on the ravish'd

ear."

And, as we have many amongst us of the sing-song tribes, who have literally sung themselves out of their industry, and into a prison, we have often something much better than Birmingham counterfeits of the two favourite originals I have mentioned. The business on those nights is conducted with all due order. A president and vicepresident are appointed; the song and the tankard go merrily round in quick succession. Notes and draughts, may, therefore, be fairly said to be in rapid currency on those occasions; and our favourite performers, though not equally fortunate in their pecuniary attainments with the Squalini's and Soprani's of the musical ton, obtain their full share of praise from the audience, and are clapped and cheered to the very skies, and the walls of the building shake with the thunder of commendation.

This room is the resort of what are deemed here, the middle class,

consisting of shopkeepers and mechanics, sent hither to improve their experience. The lower classes, satisfied with the gratification of one sense at a time, prefer the more palpable pleasures of the palate, to any thing which the modifications of sound can afford to the ears, and of course give preference to the jovial enjoyments of the Brace* and the tap, and swig porter (which they call Barclay's British Burgundy) so long as pence last. For the thirst of beer seems to be every where insatiable amongst this order of beings, and constitutes their sole goût for enjoyment.

Happy the man, who, consigned to this tomb of the living, has the means of those enjoyments which teach him to forget for a moment his captivity, which soften the rigours of imprisonment, and gild the horizon of his distant hopes. But there is a class of men here more truly pitiable than any I have mentioned, whose gloomy hemisphere the rays of hope never illumine; men whose minds are of a refinement too high to derive pleasure or gratification from any of the sources I have described, and whose talents and principles are worthy of a better fate; who hav ing been consigned to rust and canker within these walls during the bloom of life, have forgotten almost the flavour of liberty; and have nothing to contemplate in the future, but the burthen of a dull, monotonous, lingering existence, to which, death must put a desirable termination.-Adieu.

J. J. B.

ON

HORSE.

To the Editor of the Sporting Magazine.

SIR,

WHETHER it may or may not have arisen from disappointments and consequent suspicions during the last season, I am unable to say, but much speculation, and many questions, have been current of late on the subject of training the race horse. It has been said by proprietors, our risk is considerable, the first cost of sporting horses is great, and the attendant expences enormous and endless: in the mean time, we trust implicitly to our ser. vants, and to professional training grooms; but on what grounds, excepting those of ancient usage and a sort of apparent necessity? Are there not rational and standard rules, grounded on long experience, and improved by practice, for the management of the racehorse-and what are they?

With your permission, I will make at least a few general or prefatory remarks on this subject, it being in my way, and having, fiom the age of sixteen or seventeen, constituted one of the amusements of my life. Nor am I aware that it has ever done me any harm, whatever it may have done to others. It has neither hardened my heart, nor contributed to empty my purse. With respect to elementary and practical rules, there may be such in print, on an art or science, and yet so little attended to by persons concerned in such art, that their existence may be remembered through a mist, or absolutely forgotten, even by the very possessors of the books in which the articles in request are to be found. How often does this hap

failed to occur, with the possessors of agricultural books? There is a degree of laborious research required in reading a book to profit, as well as in writing one; and men find it far easier to dip here and there, and read for amusement, or to ask a few common place questions, adhering to the established routine, whatever that may chance. to be; safely and quietly contented with the common share of superficial knowledge. There are hap pily, nevertheless, and at every period, in an enlightened country, some persons naturally panting after new light and improvement, and who grudge not the indispensably requisite labour. To such only, science of all kinds owes its gradual advance, and it is a great oversight indeed, when they remain without a knowledge of what has been effected by predecessors, the very goal from which they ought

to start.

Horse racing is some centuries old in this country, derived originally from the classical examples of Greece and Rome, and writers upon the subject have not been wanting at any period; but practical, experienced, and writers in detail, on the breeding and training branches, have been few indeed. There have been many, it is true, who have pretended to that character on the slightest grounds. The earliest writer of the former class is MICHAEL BARET, author of "An Hipponomie, or Vineyard of Horsemanship," first published in 1618, and dedicated to the then reigning King, James I. with another dedication to Charles, Prince of Wales. Baret was an author of classical attainments as well as those of horsemanship, and his book, now extremely scarce, con

tains an ample and also an able and judicious detail of the theory and practice of managing the running horse in his days. His principles, generally grounded in nature and truth, are, in consequence, with little exceptions, equally applicable to the present, as to his own times, although practices have varied and improved. In latter days, about the year 1796, John Lawrence published his Treatise on Horses, developing the principles and practice of horse racing, into which he entered more minutely in a subsequent treatise, entituled, "The History of the Horse, and Delineation of the Character of the Race Horse," detailing at large the practice of the stud and of the training ground. He had practised for many years as an amateur, and for the express purpose of publishing the result of a favourite pursuit, under the instructions of a training groom of ability end repute. He was equally attached to trotters as to running horses, and his book is probably the only one which contains any thing on the subject of racing trotters. Chiffney, the jockey, also published a pamphlet, in which much is to be gathered on the subject of training. But if these writers should be deemed not sufficiently explicit and minute, I shall, with much pleasure, on some future occasion, when leisure may permit, endeavour to make up for their defects, through the pages of the Sporting Magazine.

The pretenders to this subject in former days, at the head of whom probably, stood the famous Mark ham, a predecessor of Baret, made vile, indeed an atrocious hand of it. They taught to give the race horse drink only once in twentyfour hours, as little meat as possible, in order to keep him light, and

without the incumbrance of flesh to impede his action, and to sweat him in the stable, laden with clothes, by pricking him with goads to excite him to jump about, and force out the perspiration! Later theoretical writers, to be sure, have not disgraced themselves by such vile and outrageous récommendations. They have, indeed, published some very plausible so phistries, but sophistries still they are, however plausible. Mr. Clarke of Edinburgh, for example, a very respectable writer on horse shoeing, almost half a century ago, stepped out of his line, to tell the trainers of race horses, that they might complete that business equally well, or in a superior manner, without the assistance of purgation, and even gave an instance of his own success. And some gentlemen, strongly prejudiced in favour of the military seat on horseback, would fain have it adopted upon the course, as an improvement upon the jockey seat. A match was

even made over the course in Yorkshire, some years since, on the condition that a military gentleman should ride in that style, against a jockey; and the gentleman rode his course through, with his toe in the stirrup and a straight knee, and won the race. But a few single instances prove nothing to the purpose, against the mass of practical experience, itself also grounded on rational and permanent principles. It is immoderate purgation only, which is useless or hurtful; and whoever has been accustomed to ride either gallopers or trotters in a race, will find support, safety, and comfort, in the bended knee, and in the foot placed home and firm in the stirrup.

The training of horses has been highly improved, and upon truly