the first men in the land have started their horses to lose, and required large premiums for allowing them to start at all! What think ye, country cousins, of the pleasures of a young noble, who employs a couple of clerks to keep his betting-books, and to lay their debtor and creditor account, every morning, on his breakfast table? What of the jocular phrase " rope making," which, peradventure, meaneth that the nag ye have backed, upon a proper estimate of his chance, is "pulled" to qualify him for a handicap.

Are there any laws for racing?

Are there any, and what, means for carrying them out?

Can those means be enforced?

Will they be adopted?

Under these divisions, I proceed to consider the present working system of our turf; the answers will be decisive, if they are not satisfactory.

The laws of racing are those to be found in the " Racing Calendar” under the title of "Rules and Orders of the Jockey Club." These can alone be carried into effect by popular consent; by appeal to the society for whose benefit they are intended, and upon proof of their equity of application.

Are there any means for carrying them out? The Jockey Club can warn parties off the heath at Newmarket: they have just done so in the case of Mr. Thornton, whom they have pronounced a defaulter. Now we will suppose such warning given and disregarded; they bring an action, the venue laid in Cambridgeshire; the defendant moves it by certiorari into the Queen's Bench. What damages does any reasonable man imagine a Westminster jury would award in a case of tresspass, committed upon an open heath, for the purpose of witnessing a race for a royal plate?

Can those means be enforced? There is no doubt that the Jockey Club possess a moral power whereby to purge the turf of its impurities, and to organize a healthy system, both in reference to the payment of stakes and bets; they can publish, on the authority of their standing in public consideration, a list of defaulters in forfeits and wagers, upon proof of the fact, and the instinct of self-preservation will do the rest.

Will they be adopted? I do not think they will. Were the principle carried out, not only in letter but in spirit, the race-course would, indeed, be a fit arena for the sports of gentlemen.

It may be asked why I doubt that the only remedy that could prove a specific for the diseased state of racing will be applied. The details of the present quarrel between Lord George Bentinck and the Jockey Club afford an ample reply. I take it for granted they are too well known to require recapitulation, and, therefore, confine myself to deductions from them. Lord George Bentinck accuses Mr. Gurney of being a defaulter; Mr. Gurney replies, "How dare you, my Lord, once an absentee defaulter yourself, presume to impugn the decision of a society of the first gentlemen in the world?" Are there not many cases like this?

Then look at the trial, Thornton against Portman and Beales; what a picture of the moral status of the recreation of gentlemen does such a document as the following furnish?

"Hare Park, Newmarket, Oct. 17, 1841.

"My dear sir.-We have been unable to extract your £100 from Mr. Adkins. As we must pay every one by the end of next week, I shall feel obliged by your paying the £100 you gave me an order for on Adkins to my account at Messrs. Glyn and Co., 67, Lombard-street. If you will entrust me with the order, I will do my best to extract it from Mr. Adkins. Mr. Beales and myself have sent to intimate to him, 'that without he comes to some immediate settlement of his late Derby bets, we will take the necessary steps to shut up his hell, and to persevere in preventing his opening, or being concerned in, any other. This is our only chance of bringing him to book. Will you do me the favour of acknowledging the receipt of this letter? Hester is a good horse, and I advise you not to bet against him.

With a most pleasant satire, Mr. Thesiger alluded to the rule of the Jockey Club, by which A. is exonerated from paying B. unless B. can shew that he has paid C. Is this applicable alone to betting? Undoubtedly not in spirit, and A. would be unquestionably justified in saying, "My Lord this," or "Colonel So-and-so, I will not settle my Derby account with you until you satisfy me that all your arrears of stakes and forfeits have been discharged, and that you have paid your training bills at Whitewall Corner." But absurd as the laws of betting are, what shall I say of the data by which it is regulated? The system of handicapping applies not only to the actual weight of lead put on a horse in his race, but the imaginary weight of gold laid on him in the market. He jumps from 50 to 1 to 5 to 1 on the strength of the odds quoted from Tattersall's, when, probably, not a bona fide shilling was done about him. The public are by no means placed in a situation, with reference to the real state of speculation on the great races of the year, that the magnitude of the interests involved demands. The tide in the affairs of racing," which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune," is rarely indicated by the current on the surface. Yet this is all that the bulk of those who venture their money in backing horses or fields have heretofore had to guide them. The traffic on the odds in horse-racing has now become an occupation that may be termed "a business-pleasure." Without canvassing the wisdom of such a taste, it must be dealt with as we find it.

Το

Too much mystery has too long surrounded the operations at Hyde Park Corner. It is an extremely inconvenient practice to detail occurrences without mention of the agents employed in them. remedy that inconvenience more than mere reports of the business done at Tattersall's is now required. To convey a just idea of the position of horses backed, or alleged to be backed, for the great races, not only quotations of the odds, but ample notes and comments on them, are needed. These it is my purpose to supply during the approaching season.

WAIFS OF THE WATERS.

FROM THE DIARY OF AN EX-LIEUTENANT.

CHAPTER I.

Preparations for a rough night.-Sambo's philosophy.-A cuddy dinner.Sketch of the passengers of the "John Thompson."-Stories connected with them.-Mrs. Serjeant-major's heroism in the Bheel country.-Nosey Lees, and scenes on an Indian parade-ground.

"HEAVE the log."-" Ay, ay, sir."

Chuck. Whir-r-r-r. "Stop!"-"Ite-foor" (eighty-four).

"When was the log hove last, Mr. Hanson?"" 'Bout three hours since, just after we piped to grog: she was then going an easy

seven."

"And you had the same sail on then?"-" Exactly."

"Take another reef in the fore, and furl the main tops'l. The moment it gets dark hang double lanterns in the bows: let a steady hand be constantly there on the look-out, and place another in the tops to report anything that may loom like land: above all, don't carry a stitch more during the night, even if the breeze should abate, without letting me know."

Such were the orders issued by the skipper of the John Thompson, a Glasgow merchant vessel, of 400 and odd tons, when, in the winter of 18-, after a five months' voyage from Bombay, she was entering, or about to enter, the British Channel. Frank Hardy was a young man, and this was his first independent command; but even a more experienced navigator might have found room for nervous feelings. Owing to the continued darkness of the weather, there had been no observation for many days. The ship was worked by dead reckoning, with a casual and half-understood correction, by signal from an outward-bound. It was blowing half a gale of wind, and the rain was incessant, consequently no land could be seen; but by the skipper's calculation we were somewhere off the Bill of Portland. Add to this, that the "good ship" was cranky and weather-strained. We had all but been obliged to put back to the Isle of France to repair damages, and it was only the courage and resolution of the carpenter and his mates, which, at that advanced season of the year, had saved us from such a calamity.

Under such circumstances, it will not be matter of surprise that the skipper's eye was troubled, as he hurriedly paced to and fro the deck, his hands thrust deep into the pockets of his rough P. jacket.* The rotatory motion of the lips might have been attributed to the workings of his mind, did not a slight tumour in the dexter jaw, and an occasional jet of dark fluid, betray that he had betaken himself for consolation to the pure narcotic; for Frank was none of your dandy sailors, and made no scruple to avow that he had crept through the hawse-holes, and owed his present standing solely to honest industry.

P. coats having now become as prevalent ashore as afloat, it may be as well to state, that the name originated in their constituting a portion of the purser's stores.-ED. VOL. VII.

Ꮓ

There is that in navigation which, to a contemplative mind, brings peculiarly home the might and power of science. How else can it be that a frail bark, a mere speck upon the ocean, can thus hold her unerring course through the pathless waste, and daring, as it were, the utmost power of the elements, can dive through the yawning depths, and mount triumphant over the heaving billows, that seemed formed but to devour it !

"Illi robur et æs triplex

Circa pectus erat, qui fragilem truci
Commisit pelago ratem
Primus."-

But don't be alarmed: I am not going to melt my wings, or to maunder through half a dozen pages of sickly sentiment. I wish merely to observe that, however ecstatic the feelings inspired by the mighty sea, the smell of a roasted goose, particularly when commons are growing short, is pretty sure to reduce them to a more natural level. Whether Frank Hardy's thoughts were thus employed I cannot say; but certain it is, that the savour of the aforesaid Capitol bird, as it was borne under his nose by the slave, Jim, was by no means lost upon him; for he forthwith turned into his little snuggery under the poop-awning, to new bend, and, it is to be hoped, for Mrs. Trollope's sake, to clean his teeth also

What's that next? A yam and three or four stunted potatoes, fit accompaniments for the "last" goose. "I'll not leab dee, dou lone un," said Sambo, the black cook, as he compassionately cut its throat on the preceding evening. You stare; but Sambo, I can assure you, was no common character. He was not only au fait in most of the beautiful words of Moore, but capable of singing them, too, with considerable taste and execution. Many a stiff "nor'wester," abstracted by Frank Hardy or myself from the cuddy table, had rewarded his melody; for we both stood in equal awe of the steward, a morose, halfbred Portuguese; and when those fellows are cross, they're the d—l. Sambo was aware of the difficulty we had in obtaining it, and his gratitude was in proportion. How would his white eyes glisten as he tested the potency of the mahogany-tinted treasure! Then his grace afterwards" Gwod him praise for all ting, 'tickeler for grog, massa."

Nor were Sambo's talents confined to poetry alone, for he dabbled a little in metaphysics, astrology, and divers other abstruse subjects. Heaven knows where he had been "half baptized," but the terms of science at least were familiar to him. "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing," and the smattering with which Sambo was imbued certainly did not tend to the diminution of his natural arrogance. I think I must treat you to one of his harangues, jotted down verbatim, one moonlight night, as we smoked our pipes perdue under the lee of the galley. SAMBO loquitur.

"Come here, you boy, Jim. Golley! what for him always run, run, run? 'Tan 'till I tell ye. My feelin' must ab vent. Now I read page from um hebbenly book. Berry hard book dat, Jim, but nebber fear, pose you no sabby ebbery word I speak, ax question agin. He! he he! den rewolve upon um's axes. Now look! See dat round yellow light dat shine dere up in um hebbens? Kye. What you tink make dat?"

Why the moon, to be sure!"

"Ho, you dam ignoran' white boy!-Not dat him so white nieder. Pshaugh! no fit to touch wid de tongs. Dat not de moonlight."

"Well, dash my wig-(an abstersion, by the way, by no means uncalled for)-dash my wig if ever I heard the like o' that afore!"

"No, sir, dat de light ob um sun. You tink, 'cause nebber reflect, dat de sun gone dead; but leab um light behind, and de sensible moon him reflect it."

Here Sambo paused, and gazed with wrapped vision, now on the luminary, now in Jim's face; but finding no response in the wooden and dirt-grimed features of the latter, he shook his head with intense disgust, and thus proceeded :

"Pose you tink too de world all flat, and nebber stir. Hech! World more round nor orange, and always go whirl, whirl, whirl, at end ob um chain, jist same as I spin knife wid lanyard. And reason for why all men nebber fall off; dat, sir, what we call de centipede attraction. But och, whurra! what for talk? It plain you no comperhen' ebbery ten word I 'peak. Dere (hitting him a rap on the head), go scour um pot, and grubble like pig in um native helement."

In the meantime we are keeping the dinner, such as it is, waiting. The captain has taken his place at the head, his back supported by the mizen-mast, for the table is rigged lengthwise in the narrow* cuddy; over against him, and close to the door, sits the little round-shouldered Scotch doctor. Mr. Hanson, the chief mate, and myself, on one side, have, for vis-à-vis, two plump, good-humoured ladies of the th, about to join their husbands on furlough in England. Between them, disguised in a clean shirt-frill, sits Master Tommy Lees; but more of him, and of our fair neighbours, too, when the hurry of dinner is over. A plate, with a glass of grog, has just been sent up to the second mate, who, on the poop, bides the fury of the pitiless blast, by the effects of which, even below, we are sadly incommoded. The captain, after a very needless apology, considering our time at sea, has promised to indemnify us for the meagre fare, with a claret of superior quality.

"Come, skipper, none of your tricks. Not from the bins of your friends, Dugald Do'em and Thievish M'Tak'emin, of Cape Town, I hope."

"No. Honour bright. I got this batch from a particular hand in Funchal Roads, out of a Frenchman direct from Bourdeaux.

"And ped for it wi' twal' yards of the spare fores'l, the whilk we mun' carry away this blessed night," pawkily observed the doctor. "You're another," retorted the skipper. "Was the bread dear when you made your last batch of pills, doctor?"

"Troth there was plenty of the barm in them anyways," said Mrs. Murphy," for they worked purely, as Mary and myself can testify."

These two worthy ladies, Mesdames Murphy and Jenkinson, were married to the quarter-master and serjeant-major of H. M.'s -th. They had both sprung from the ranks, and their topics, consisting prin

It is necessary, for the purpose of the story, as will be seen anon, that the reader should understand the formation of the after-part of our ship, which differed from that of most Indiamen: in them, the cuddy runs athwart ship, and you pass through it to an upper tier of stern cabins; in ours, you descended some steps into the cuddy, which ran fore and aft, having its breadth much impinged on by a row of cabins on either side; there was no second or lower tier aft.