ai E> R.AFLY 
 
 OF THL 
 UN IVLR5ITY 
 Of ILLINOIS 
 
 823 
 T843 
 
 cop. d.
 
 THE TURF
 
 LONDON : 
 
 IBOTSON AND PALMBR, PHINTERS, SAVOY STRBBT, STRAND.
 
 THE TURF. 
 
 A SATIRICAL NOVEL. 
 
 Who Starves by nobles, or with nobles eats 1 
 
 The wretch that trusts them, and the rogue that cheats. 
 
 Is there a lord who knows a cheerful noon 
 
 Without a fiddler, flatterer, or buffoon ? 
 
 Whose table, wit or modest merit share, 
 
 Un-elbowed by a gamester, pimp, or player 1 
 
 Pope. 
 
 IN TWO VOLUMES. 
 VOL. I. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 HENRY COLBURN AND RICHARD BENTLEY, 
 
 NEW BURLINGTON STREET. 
 
 1831.
 
 •5^' 
 
 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes ; 
 
 Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm. 
 
 GRAY. 
 
 ^ Twenty-five summers had passed over 
 the head of Edward Montville when, freed 
 ^ from the restraint of College life, he prepared 
 _^to make what used to be called the " Grand 
 c< Tour." About this time, too, he came into 
 |"possession of his title and of a princely for- 
 
 k. 
 
 ^ tune, left him by his father, (an old Peer) 
 
 ^: VOL. I. B
 
 » THE TURF. 
 
 who died the year before, and had directed in 
 his will that his son and heir should not touch 
 the property till he should have arrived at 
 twenty-five years of age. The commence- 
 ment of the young nobleman's career was a 
 brilliant one; he had been already ushered into 
 life with all the observances peculiar to his 
 rank, such as a presentation at the court of 
 his sovereign, and introductions to the high- 
 est society; and, as might naturally be ex- 
 pected, he had formed numerous connexions 
 at Cambridge. During his travels also, he 
 met with a great number of the most dashing 
 youths of rank and fashion. 
 
 But it was on his return home that the 
 life, emphatically speaking, of our hero may 
 be said to have commenced. Even whilst 
 under age, and in spite of his father's restric- 
 tions, money had been at his command, and he 
 had been assailed by all the temptations by 
 which interested and vicious persons deprave 
 the health, bodily and mental, of youth, and
 
 THE TURF. 3 
 
 plunder them of property, even while it is 
 only yet in prospect. Complying ladies, 
 obliging friends, and accommodating money- 
 lenders had, in his young days, flocked around 
 him, so that it will not be thought surprising 
 that, to a great extent, his expectations had 
 been already drawn upon. On coming into 
 possession of his broad lands and well-stored 
 coffers, the demands against him amounted 
 to about ten thousand pounds; but as the old 
 Peer had constantly large disposable funds 
 in the hands of his banker, the above claims 
 were not considered enormous, but were liqui- 
 dated at once by the young heir's trustees. 
 
 To use a familiar phrase, our hero now 
 " started fair.'' He had a fine person, was ac- 
 complished in all that distinguishes a gentle- 
 man, was possessed of unincumbered means, 
 and was not altogether destitute of reflection ; 
 and though no one plunged more deeply into 
 dissipation, nor was a more confirmed volup- 
 tuary, yet nature had stamped him for better 
 B 2
 
 4 THE TURF. 
 
 things, and had gifted him with faculties of a 
 higher order. No knowledge was too difficult 
 for the compass of his mind ; but, unluckily, 
 youth must run its course of folly — the cool 
 exercise of the head cannot be expected, till 
 the fever of the heart has passed away. 
 
 On Lord Dorimont's debut in the gay 
 world, he became at once the " observed of 
 all observers." Manoeuvring tradesmen emu- 
 lated each other in the length of credit offered 
 to him. Costly articles were forced on him 
 by jewellers; the country was scoured by 
 horse-dealers, in order that the finest cattle 
 in England might be procured; his levees 
 were obsequiously attended by rival coach- 
 makers, and his good taste was proclaimed 
 aloud by tailors, who succeeded in persuad- 
 ing him that it was he who set the fashion in 
 costume. Had his brain been a weak one, 
 here was adulation enough to turn it, as the 
 phrase is, on his very commencement in 
 fashionable life.
 
 THE TURF. 5 
 
 But these were not all the excitements 
 thrown in his path. There were other dan- 
 gers than those which had their origin in 
 tradesmen. Our rich young heir was con- 
 sidered fit game for higher beasts of prey 
 titled plunderers, honourable asso- 
 ciates, patrician thieves, by whom youth and 
 inexperience are uniformly surrounded. So 
 inviting and so numerous were the schemes 
 prepared for him, that his stock of self-con- 
 trol became inadequate to resist their influ- 
 ence. He was elected a member of the best 
 clubs — ^liis presence was eagerly coveted in 
 those circles where were to be found the 
 gayest of the gay — beauty courted him — liis 
 own sex flattered ; and over this path of rosesr, 
 he was insidiously led into the most delicious 
 scenes of what may be termed the romance 
 of high life. The turf, the gaming table, 
 the smiles of woman, lay all before him; 
 nor could he refrain from drinking deeply 
 of pleasure's intoxicating cup, until, elate
 
 6 THE TURF. 
 
 with success, he lavished the means of pos- 
 sessing it, without measure or foresight. 
 
 Whilst this perilous game was going on, 
 a gentler agency tried its arts to gain him. 
 Matrimonial alliances were proposed; and, 
 as already the meretricious arts of courtezans 
 had been exerted to the utmost, he was now 
 assailed at Opera, " at home," ball, soiree, 
 and assembly, by the chaster, though hardly 
 less venal, charms of maiden candidates for 
 matrimony. His inclinations, however, did 
 not lead him that way. He saw so much 
 conjugal infelicity, such splendid misery, such 
 hymeneal infidelity in high life, that he 
 dreaded the imposition of connubial fetters, 
 and preferred a batchelor's freedom to the 
 most apparently desirable match. His guar- 
 dian, indeed, had a very pretty and piquant 
 daughter, who was not, like the Celia of the 
 poet, " coy and hard to win;" but, attractive 
 as she might be in other respects, she wanted 
 " style." One of our hero's country neigh-
 
 THE TURF. T 
 
 hours, Lord Hammond, had a choice of three 
 young ladies, all of whom had been perfectly 
 initiated in the routine of fashionable life, 
 and knew how^ to improve to the utmost 
 those natural fascinations of which they were 
 far from destitute. Added to these personal 
 advantages, was the important consideration, 
 that their father's estate joined that of the 
 young peer. Still he could not divest him- 
 self of the thought, that if he once ventured 
 on matrimony, the practised enchantments 
 of the dear creature whom he might elect 
 for his wife, might either cease, or be dis- 
 played only for the gratification of another. 
 This, alas ! is too common a case in the 
 fashionable world. 
 
 The disinclination for matrimony enter- 
 tained by our hero, was fostered by his at- 
 tachment to " the turf," which is in itself 
 enough to occupy wholly a man's time and 
 thoughts. Lord Dorimont's anti-nuptial in- 
 clinations were still further confirmed by a
 
 8 THE TURF. 
 
 Spring in London, during which his affec- 
 tions were fixed (so at least he thought) on 
 the wife of a noble brother sportsman. The 
 lady was a star of beauty, darting her rays in 
 the firmament of intrigue, and worshipped 
 by the crowd with even more than Chaldean 
 enthusiasm. To her other charms, she added 
 a winning pensiveness; and, with an equivo- 
 cal smile and languishing eye, she gave her 
 devoted lover to understand that she was 
 neglected by her husband. 
 
 A hint of this kind is irresistible. Lord 
 Dorimont laid his plans accordingly; and, as 
 we never hate any one so cordially as the man 
 we design to injure, his lordship's companion 
 of the field became odious to him. It is true 
 that he professed for his soi-disant friend a 
 greater degree of cordiality than before, but 
 this was only that appearances might be the 
 better kept up, and that he might have un- 
 restrained liberty in visiting at the house 
 where lived his charmer.
 
 THE TURF. y 
 
 Though in all this there was unquestionably 
 a great breach of honour and good faith be- 
 tween man and man, still the " injured hus- 
 band," felt it much less than one of other 
 habits would have done. His jealousy was 
 lulled by Bacchus. The fear of dishonour, 
 the dread of shame, were blunted by a con- 
 sciousness of his own offences against the mar- 
 riage state : dissipation had long alienated him 
 from the society of his wife, and he dared not 
 tax her with imprudencies lest she might re- 
 criminate, and turn the tables on him. 
 
 Here let us pause, and throw a veil over 
 the remainder of the picture. A careful ra- 
 conteur will know when circumspection, if 
 not concealment, are required of him. With- 
 out affecting a paradox, it may be said that 
 there are many particulars in a story which 
 are best communicated by being untold. 
 
 For some time this unhallowed intrigue 
 went on with seeming happiness; but it 
 could not, in its nature, long endure. Link
 
 10 THE TURF. 
 
 after link of the flowery chain gave way, and 
 at length mutual upbraidings, rendered more 
 poignant by a sense of mutual guilt, made 
 the interviews between the gallant and the 
 adultress, occasions rather of torment than of 
 love. 
 
 On one of these meetings, which was more 
 than usually insupportable, the lady suddenly, 
 and in an angry tone, exclaimed " This is 
 misery — let us snap the bond at once ! " A 
 woman is seldom more interesting than when 
 in tears ; and as the above exclamation was 
 followed by heavy weeping, the admiration 
 of our hero was temporarily revived ; but it 
 was only the last expiring flash of love, soon 
 doomed to be utterly extinct. The lady, 
 nevertheless, speedily indemnified herself 
 with another gallant, and thus ended the 
 amour. 
 
 The young peer felt that now there 
 was a blank in his heart. Satiated love and 
 broken vows, lead to sadness and remorse;
 
 THE TURF. 11 
 
 but a man of wealth and dissipation has so 
 many solaces within his reach, that the dis- 
 ease of melancholy is soon cured. The cha- 
 grin attending this loss of his first love 
 plunged our hero, as is too often the case 
 with young men of ardent minds, into a 
 whirl of dissipation, when luckily another loss 
 opened his* eyes, and drew him from the ruin- 
 ous vortex. The fact is, that Lord Dorimont 
 had squandered many enormous sums; his 
 ready money had melted like vapours in the 
 sun ; his woods groaned under the axe ; part 
 of his entailed property was encumbered by 
 mortgages; his country mansion was suffering 
 under dilapidation ; his tradesmen's bills were 
 heavy, and he stood on the wrong side of his 
 banker's books. 
 
 But, worse than all, he had some heavy 
 bets to pay; and although his credit was as 
 yet unimpaired, and he stood high in the 
 circle in which he moved, he feared a re- 
 verse, for he loved play, he loved racing, he
 
 12 THE TURF. 
 
 was ambitious, he was impassioned and ar- 
 dent. Entangled in the toils of dissipation, 
 he had been played upon, and thrown over — 
 was duped, and he knew it — pigeoned, and 
 he felt it. Resentment, or complaint, would, 
 in his case, be worse than useless. He was 
 reduced to a very common, but a very me- 
 lancholy predicament. His pleasures had 
 cost him dear ; the heroines of the boudoir, 
 no less than those of the ballet, lead directly 
 or indirectly to large disbursements; for, 
 whether the love-sick swain dance after a 
 coroneted caprice, or follow a favourite dan- 
 cer on the boards, he must ultimately have to 
 pay the piper to no very merry tune. 
 
 In one word. Lord Dorimont was deeply 
 dipped. He had, nevertheless, the good 
 sense to conceal it, being, as has already beei* 
 said, a man of strong mind. So little were 
 his embarrassments suspected, that he might 
 have continued much longer to haunt the 
 scenes of dissipation, and by resorting to
 
 THE TURF. 13 
 
 shifts and evasions, have maintained for a 
 few years his station as a prominent cha- 
 racter, or retreated on a matrimonial make- 
 up ; but he felt all this to be unworthy his 
 rank as a nobleman, and ruinous of his self- 
 esteem as an honest man. 
 
 A year or two had now been passed in the 
 beau-monde by our hero, and it was frightful 
 to contemplate the vast amount squandered 
 in so short a time. Still, as he did not con- 
 fide to any one the situation of his affairs, 
 detection was kept aloof; and, though he was 
 occasionally annoyed by vague rumours, yet 
 as he paid regularly the interest of monies 
 borrowed, and as his establishment under- 
 went no reduction, tradesmen feared to be 
 importunate. The external magnificence 
 which he still maintained, stood him in good 
 stead. He had, moreover, the faculty of 
 seeming to be gay when ill indeed at ease ; 
 and above all, as we have said, he knew the 
 value of silence.
 
 14 THE TURF, 
 
 The continent was still open to the visits 
 of the English. A tour to France was the 
 rage of the day. The seance of Fashion's 
 court was transferred from London to Paris, 
 and thus an admirable opportunity was given 
 to any one who wished to escape from defeat 
 without leaving it to be suspected that he 
 was beaten. A retreat could be made almost 
 in the manner of a triumph ; and our hero, 
 with his usual dexterity, availed himself of 
 this position of affairs, and, under pretence 
 of a foreign tour, escaped from the toils that 
 were gathering fast around him at home. 
 His departure was publicly announced ; grand 
 preparations were made; he set off in the 
 best style, with a handsome sum of money, 
 per letter of credit on Lafitte, the source of 
 which was supplied by the sale of an estate, 
 to take place after his departure, and by the 
 letting of his residence in the country. For 
 these purposes a power of attorney was left 
 with a very singular person — a person whose
 
 THE TURF. 15 
 
 character may be said to be without parallel, 
 — an honest attorney, who had been many 
 years professionally concerned for the peer's 
 family. 
 
 Part of Lord Dorimont's time was passed 
 in Italy and Germany; but his head-quarters 
 were fixed at Paris, where he became a close 
 observer of men and manners, which are no 
 where so fully and so variously developed as in 
 the metropolis of France. Of these, he saw 
 more, and understood more, than in his for- 
 mer visit ; and here he had ample time to re- 
 flect on the past, and to form proper estimates 
 of those sunshine friends, who had professed so 
 much sincerity in the hour of prosperity. In 
 Paris, however, even the contemplative man 
 must be gay. Human wisdom and reflection 
 are there directed to their only legitimate 
 end, human happiness ; and the melancholy 
 Englishman may there learn lessons in con- 
 duct and in opinion, which will benefit him 
 for his life. But such lessons were not needed
 
 16 THE TURF. 
 
 by our hero, who was by natural tempera- 
 ment of a joyous disposition. He was no 
 Timon of Athens ; for while he acquired ex- 
 perience, he followed the paths of pleasure, 
 and failed not to turn to account many sin- 
 gular opportunities of which we shall, by and 
 by, have occasion to speak. 
 
 In these pursuits of mingled pleasure, ob- 
 servation and reflection, ten years passed 
 away.
 
 THE TURF. 17 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 
 I know you all ; and will awhile uphold 
 The unyoked humour of your idleness. 
 
 HENRY IV. 
 
 At the commencement of his sejour abroad, 
 the great influx of English visitors to the 
 French capital was such, that it was impos- 
 sible for Lord Dorimont to appear at any 
 place of fashionable resort, without meeting, in 
 great numbers, the companions of his youth 
 and pleasurable hours in London ; but as we 
 shall have to name these hereafter, as con- 
 nected with the turf and the gaming-table, 
 
 VOL. I. c
 
 18 THE TURF. 
 
 we shall only allude, en passant^ to those 
 whose extravagance or vice had disqualified J 
 them for remaining at home. Such gentry ' 
 were generally to be met with at the Salon, 
 Frascati's, and at houses of private play. 
 
 The fate of one man caused Lord Don- | 
 mont no little regret. His name was Tibalt ; 
 he was a friend of our hero's father, and for 
 many years had borne the character of an 
 honourable gentleman. He had been a mem- 
 ber of most of the clubs in town, yet he 
 never was what is called a play-man ; nor did 
 he entertain the most remote idea that it 
 could at any time become necessary to him to 
 draw his resources from dice or cards; but 
 the scene was now unfortunately changed ! 
 Tibalt*s means were sadly reduced; and, 
 under the pressure of poverty, which came 
 suddenly on him " like an armed man," he 
 had been tempted to retrieve his misfortunes 
 by dishonourable means, and had fallen a 
 victim to the fallacious idea of winning by
 
 THE TURF. 19 
 
 calculation at that destructive game " rouge 
 et noir." 
 
 Nothing can be more ruinously delusive 
 than the schemes which many miserable indi- 
 viduals practice in the hope of securing 
 eventual gain at the gaming-table. We have 
 seen a score of dupes all possessing systems 
 more or less intricate, and derived, as they 
 thought, from long practice and observation ; 
 but which nevertheless led uniformly to one 
 end — defeat, beggary, infamy ! Some of 
 these wretched victims have sunk under the 
 weight of poverty and despair ; others have 
 made an unhallowed compromise with their 
 consciences; and, joining with plunderers, 
 have become the decoys of those who had 
 brought them to their fallen state. 
 
 Another old acquaintance, who failed not 
 to cultivate the intimacy of Lord Dorimont, 
 was a certain Lord Dalzel. This peer was a 
 man of taste ; an inveterate gourmand and 
 great consumer of viands and wines. His 
 c2
 
 20 THE TURF. 
 
 Lordship, when at school, was nick-named 
 " the Pig ; " an early appellation which he 
 fully justified by becoming afterwards a hore 
 of the first magnitude. Not content with 
 this honourable distinction, he aspired to the 
 character of a gallant; but though Venus did 
 indeed smile upon him, it was not in ap- 
 proval but in scorn. To his cash alone is 
 his Lordship indebted for the very little re- 
 putation he enjoys; and which cannot be 
 raised above its low pitch even by a splendid 
 equipage and appointments, under the super- 
 intendence of Jolly Reynard, a ci-devant cor- 
 net of dragoons, and son of a wholesale ven- 
 dor of Turkey rhubarb. The situation of 
 Master of the Horse to Lame Leg, which 
 Jolly enjoys, is not unattended by some little 
 trouble, and even personal danger; as a 
 proof of which it is well known that Coachee 
 threatened one day to thrash him for his 
 officious and tyrannical interference in the 
 stable.
 
 THE TURF. 21 
 
 But to return to Lord Dalzel when at Paris. 
 His Lordship's rank gave him no importance 
 in the saloon, especially when he was what is 
 called "in low feather;" but when he had 
 money to sport, he became a star there, not- 
 withstanding his having once hopped off, and 
 given a lame account of himself without re- 
 collecting what he owed to old Florio the 
 waiter, or to the accommodating Madame 
 # # # #^ who presided at Frascati's, whose 
 house he hired and forgot to pay for. 
 
 Two other unlucky qualities in this 
 Right Honourable's composition, are his 
 hauteur, which is always thrusting him upon 
 the commission of insults, and his backward- 
 ness to give the necessary satisfaction for 
 them by fighting. Witness his insolent re- 
 ception of the Honourable Mr. Eagle, to 
 whom he was indebted, and from whom, and 
 from his brother, Lord Eagle, he had re- 
 ceived kindness and hospitality. At the 
 time when these favours were shown him.
 
 »a THE TURF. 
 
 Lord Dalzel was only an honourable Mister, 
 and, being somewhat " shy," as the phrase 
 is, was glad to sponge upon any man, more 
 especially if a good kitchen was to be found 
 in his house. In proof of this, it may be 
 mentioned, that he once left his friend. Lord 
 Eagle, with whom he was staying, that he 
 might take up his quarters with a stranger 
 who accidentally invited him to dinner. The 
 reason given for this rudeness was, that the 
 latter kept the best cook ! Such is the worth 
 of Lord DalzePs friendship. * 
 
 His declining to fight Sir Sandy Belso, 
 
 * Amongst the many vain and ridiculous vagaries 
 of this lordling, that of sporting a Colonel of Ca- 
 valry's uniform at Brussels was not the least con- 
 temptible. He had long ceased to be in the army, in 
 which he had never been anything more than a very 
 heavy Dragoon Sub. ; nevertheless he appeared with 
 dashing epaulets, enormous spurs, and a cane of a 
 staff- appearance, which he awkwardly wielded, get- 
 ting his spurs entangled with it.
 
 THE TURF. 23 
 
 and many others to whom he owed debts of 
 honour which he refused to pay, supersedes 
 the necessity of further evidence as to his 
 valour. Sir Sandy, however, found a sum- 
 mary mode of bringing him to book, by send- 
 ing his friend the Colonel with a message, 
 and giving his Lordship ten minutes to de- 
 cide whether he would fight or pay. This 
 was an ugly dilemma; the noble Lord 
 bravely produced his money, adding to it an 
 abject apology ! The success of Sir Sandy 
 induced others to adopt the same expedient ; 
 but, alas ! without a repetition of the same 
 good fortune, for his Lordship made up his 
 mind rather to be posted than pay. Poor 
 Hal ! " what a piece of work art thou ! " 
 Cura^oa and Champagne cannot save thee. 
 
 Let us not forget a pleasant little anec- 
 dote connected with Lord Dalzel, and which 
 illustrates his character as a nobleman and a 
 gentleman. On his retreat, or rather escape, 
 from Paris in former days, ere added rank
 
 24 THE TURF. 
 
 and fortune had altered but not improved 
 him, he found himself shut up in a stage- 
 coach travelling north with an individual, 
 who, on removing his cap from his eyes at 
 day-break, was recognised as a very unwel- 
 come companion. The person in question 
 was a certain Mr. Steers (so let us call him) 
 tp whom the honourable fellow-traveller stood 
 indebted in the unpaid arrears of an annuity 
 long since due and greatly accumulated. 
 What was now to be done ? The ingenuity 
 and presence of mind of a dozen swindlers 
 condensed, like Colman's " two single gen- 
 tlemen," into one, would hardly suffice in 
 such a very awkward predicament. For 
 once the sapient Pig was at fault, but time 
 was not to be lost ; and after concealing, as 
 well as he could, the effects of his first em- 
 barrassment, he greeted his companion with 
 an assumed friendly recognition, which in- 
 spired new hope in the breast of the cre- 
 ditor.
 
 THE TURF. 25 
 
 Our fellow-travellers took refreshment to- 
 gether. Lord Dalzel manifested no desire to 
 conceal anything, no design to escape, no 
 wish to shake off a troublesome companion ; 
 on the contrary, he engaged Mr. Steers to 
 look out for quarters for him in town, 
 invited him to join him there, and receive 
 the monies due. This apparent frankness 
 and cordiality lulled every suspicion on the 
 part of Steers, who complied with the direc- 
 tions of his honourable debtor ; and was re- 
 warded in the end, not only with the " bag 
 to hold," but the house to hold and pay for 
 as long as his patience lasted. 
 
 It will be easier to conceive than to express 
 the disappointment felt by Steers on finding 
 himself so egregiously duped. But when the 
 friendly fellow-traveller became a peerless 
 peer. Steers recollected what had passed, and 
 charged him for two years' house-rent, which 
 he forced the noble Lord to pay. The New- 
 market man was at length too much for him,
 
 db THE TURF. 
 
 and the biter was bit. For the present we 
 shall take our leave of lying limping Hal. 
 
 Another frequenter of those destructive 
 haunts of gamesters, the Salon and Frascati's, 
 was known by the name of Lord Planet, an 
 appellation which had its origin in the fact of 
 his lordship having been born under an un- 
 lucky star. After having abstained for twenty 
 years from cards, this noble personage fell 
 into the common snare, and became one of 
 the many victims of the prevalent vice which 
 levels ranks, undermines happiness, and dissi- 
 pates fortunes as a gust of wind scatters the 
 autumnal leaves. 
 
 But remarkable characters were not only 
 to be found at this time among the male ac- 
 quaintance of our hero. Several of the ladies 
 were equally conspicuous for the fi*eedom, if 
 not disgracefulness of their lives. Lady Blos- 
 somfled is, we are sorry to say it, our country- ; 
 woman; one of the many who, instead of 
 standing as bright examples of the British
 
 THE TURF. 27 
 
 matron, are held up to the view of the con- 
 tinental fair, as specimens of the morality of 
 our higher ranks. It is said by the courtly 
 belles on the other side of the water, that our 
 chilly women are mere hypocrites ; that their 
 coolness goes no further than external ap- 
 pearance ; that when the mask is thrown off 
 their gallantry knows no bounds ; and, unfor- 
 tunately, a number of French cavaliers, the 
 •favoured of our frail countrywomen, can attest 
 the truth thereof. If there is an Anglomanie 
 among these foreigners, there is a Gallomanie 
 amongst our dames of high life. We do not 
 admire their taste; but de gustihus non est 
 disputandum. Lady Blossomfled has not only 
 adopted the fastly prevailing fashion of taking 
 an amant a titre, a regular cavaliere servante^ 
 but she has transferred the man of her choice 
 to her daughter ; has thus fixed a family tie 
 which causes feelings of indignation in every 
 bosom. How revolting is this ! what a 
 triumph for our censuring neighbours ! In-
 
 28 THE TURF. 
 
 deed the columns of our Sunday prints 
 trumpet our mala fama to all polished Eu- 
 rope. " On ne voit,^* said a French noble- 
 man, the other day, " dans vos gazettes 
 que des lihertinages de vos dames ; as to us,'* 
 continued he, " we are tout comme les 
 autres ; but we say nothing about it, and 
 this perhaps is best." With which obser- 
 vation we will take leave of this strange 
 family party, in links interwoven by most 
 unholy hands.
 
 THE TURF. 29 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 'Tis midnight — just the hour to introduce you 
 Into the loftier sphere of the Salon : 
 You may see thousands lost, and, as you choose, you 
 Can play at Rouge et Noir, or shake the bone : 
 But don't suppose, you inexperienced goose, you ! 
 That any one can stumble in alone : 
 You must be here presented quite in state. Sir — 
 Heaven bless your soul — a Marquis is head-waiter ! 
 read's *' Rouge et Noir." 
 
 Much as the gaming-table engrossed Lord 
 Dorimont's time, the promenade and the 
 boudoir had their share. La brune et la
 
 30 THE TURF. 
 
 blonde ^" lurns exercised their influence over 
 hiir till at length, after a little fluttering 
 about, he fixed his choice on a certain Comp- 
 tesse, whose personal charms and adorned 
 mind justified the preference thus bestowed 
 on her. Our hero also frequented the amhi" 
 gus soirees of a certain Baroness which were 
 given at a Ducal Hotel. The intrigue and 
 match-making of this Lady formed part of 
 the bill of fare proffered to her guests. 
 
 Though, on quitting England, Lord Dori- 
 mont had resolved to abandon his most ex- 
 pensive habits, yet the turf was not to be ob- 
 literated from his mind. His decided taste 
 for this kind of gaming had been confirmed 
 by long habit. We shall soon have enough 
 to say on the subject of the turf. At pre- 
 sent let us make a slight sketch of the Parisian 
 races. Ever since the peace with England 
 these have been rapidly improving, and they 
 are now nearly equal to our own. The 
 Due de Guiche is a prominent patron of
 
 THE TURF. 31 
 
 these sports. He is an amiable, kirii? -J?earted, 
 hospitable man, full of honourable hL,mg9 
 and much attached to the English. When 
 in England he had become acquainted with 
 Lord Dorimont, whom he was now delighted 
 to welcome in his own native land, to which 
 he is an ornament. This rencontre produced a 
 revival of his lordship's habits; and having sent 
 home for a couple of racers, he engaged 
 actively in the Parisian sports, and was a con- 
 stant frequenter of all the races. On one 
 occasion, he was present at a fete given in the 
 Duke*s stables, splendidly lit up with wax, a 
 circumstance not unusual in the grand racing 
 association to which he belonged. 
 
 Having said this much of the Duke, it 
 would be ungallant indeed were we not to 
 mention in terms of the highest praise his 
 lovely wife, — a leader ofbon-ton, a star of the 
 first brilliance in the choicest circles of Paris. 
 Beauty of person, kindness of heart, a happy 
 dash of English feeling which circumstances
 
 32 THE TURF. 
 
 have mixed up in her composition, render the 
 Duchesse a most delightful woman. The 
 curled lip of envy, the blighting tongue of 
 slander, the depraved taste for scandal, are 
 defeated as regards the Duchesse de Guiche, in 
 whom they are at a loss to detect a blemish. 
 She is an ornament to the Court of the Bour- 
 bons, which requires beauty and vivacity to 
 relieve the sad, proud, distant, priest-ridden, 
 cold, stiff propriety which prevents it from 
 shining in the lustre of former days. Napo- 
 leon once said, "ikfa cour ne hrille que de 
 V eclat des armes,'^ The vieille cour was that 
 of gallantry, dress, magnificence, boundless 
 expenditure, intrigue, and general voluptu- 
 ousness. Every thing, in short, was in a perni- 
 cious extreme, and the present Court, instead 
 of adopting the " golden mean," has gone to 
 the other excess ; the Loves and Graces are 
 proscribed, and independence of thought and 
 speech is repressed by an over-jealous sur- 
 veillance.
 
 THE TURF. 33 
 
 We will not swell our page with Paris 
 " Insipids" — with the worthless nobodies who 
 lounge about in the Rue de la Paix, the 
 Tuilleries, and the Boulevards, and who fill 
 the private salons of ecarte and other games ; 
 such worthies, for example, as Mr, Wide- 
 hood, the descendant of the brewer, and other 
 shoots of trade, who sport their insignificance 
 with an exterior of assumed fashion, or rather 
 7nauvais ton, and who, though nobody at 
 home, have crept into high company abroad, 
 by giving dinners and playing deeply, by 
 contributing to support the salons by their 
 losses, and by feeding and lending money to 
 needy French nobility and half-pay British 
 paupers. Any man who keeps a good coach, 
 gives iced champagne, and loses his* money 
 with indifference at the salon and at Frascati's, 
 will worm himself into the greatest circles. He 
 will be admired and plundered by strangers, 
 and his own countrymen abroad may pro- 
 bably be tempted just to endure him. But 
 
 VOL. I. D
 
 34 THE TURF. 
 
 on returning to his native land he must not 
 expect to be admitted into the brilliant 
 circles of the West in the great Babel, Lon- 
 don. It is from this cause that such charac- 
 ters as those we have hinted at affect to prefer 
 Paris to London. They know instinctively 
 that in the latter they would be lost. 
 
 Apropos to the private salons. Our task 
 would be but ill accomplished were we not to 
 denounce the dangerous tendency of these 
 places, where a variety of lures are held out 
 to drain the purses of the unwary. At some, 
 the dinners are so good and so convenient 
 and so amusing, that there is no resisting 
 the bait ; and then the artifice practised by 
 the form of making it a favour to put down a 
 stranger's name as a member of so charming 
 a reunion is so flattering, and looks so dis- 
 interested on the part of the proprietors, 
 (who are little suspected of having no other 
 resource than the fruits of the play-table,) 
 that nothing is less suspected than unfair
 
 THE TURF. 35 
 
 play. At other salons the variety of enter- 
 tainment, presented to idleness and extrava- 
 gance, has its peculiar captivation — occasional 
 balls, private theatricals, little concerts, the 
 sprightly and significant conversation of smil- 
 ing belles, and the never-failing ecarte, piquet, 
 or rouge-et-noir. 
 
 A certain ci-devant Captain in our service, 
 who married an Admiral's daughter, and was 
 afterwards an associate of a handsome-faced, 
 club-footed, French Marquis, who kept a 
 little-go at Boulogne-sur-Mer, is at the head 
 of many of these cut-purse establishments. 
 
 Although born in France, Monsieur V — 
 speaks English as fluently as a native, has 
 very great conversational talent, and makes 
 the dinners and the wine, although not so 
 good as those of the circle des etrangers, go 
 off a merveille. 
 
 A novice will naturally form some very 
 inviting acquaintances at these assemblies, 
 which lead to other parties, to dejeuners a la 
 D 2
 
 36 THE TURF. 
 
 fourchette ond. fetes champ^tresinxhe summer, 
 at which he will pay the piper imperceptibly, 
 and still feel grateful for the marked atten- 
 tion of being made one of a select few. He 
 may also, if introduced, like a well-born flat, 
 by a certain female writer of memoirs, deem 
 himself honoured by being a bottom-of-the- 
 table guest at other ambigu parties, and may 
 even plume himself on being admitted to 
 the extraordinaires of the Frascati's glorious 
 set."^ 
 
 If such a mode of living suit the disposition 
 of any man, he may live far more gaily in 
 Paris than in London, and not pay so dearly 
 for his entertainment as he would at Hookey 's 
 Palace in the West, or by trusting to the 
 advice oi friends at a race, and being the 
 
 * Madame Frascati gives occasionally an extra- 
 ordinaire, in the form of a ball and supper, where 
 very valuable acquaintances may be made, and where 
 very valuable property may be melted down to defray 
 the expenses, direct and indirect, which follow.
 
 THE TURF. 3t 
 
 victim of the confederacy of such worthies as 
 Pugil, Mace, Blaze, and Co. 
 
 The preference we have given to Parisian 
 robbery, as compared with our own, will, 
 perhaps, be disputed by some. It will be 
 urged that many unfortunate victims have 
 passed from the Ecarte salons, and from 
 the morning and evening circles for play, 
 and other pastime, to the dreary walls of la 
 Sainte Pilagee, whence there is no issuing by 
 the white- washing act ; that every facility is 
 given, from the salon to the minor hells, for 
 converting property to cash ; such as an ac- 
 commodating bank, waiters ready to make 
 advances by way of loan ; and a neighbour- 
 ing commissaire du Mont de Piete, near the 
 vile hell in the Palais Roy ale ;* and lastly, 
 
 * The Palais Royale was, in former times, nick- 
 named la Foret d' Orleans, in honour of the name 
 of its proprietor, and to prove that, in the language 
 of the French gambler, " On est vole comme dans 
 un hois." (A man is robbed as if he were in a wood.)
 
 38 THE TURF. 
 
 that suicide has often been committed, on 
 quitting these scenes of plunder. But this 
 proves nothing. The victim of the turf and 
 gaming-table will, in England, find money- 
 lenders in abundance, as long as the infa- 
 tuated gamester has any security to produce ; 
 and in England also are considerately pro- 
 vided a lock-up house and a prison to receive 
 his body as a deposit for his debts. The 
 only preference due to merry England is the 
 great facility which the Insolvent and Bank- 
 rupt Acts afford men for emerging from 
 durance vile, and for beginning a fresh scene. 
 This, however, never happens until a man's 
 whole property has melted away. Touching 
 suicide, this crime, in our own country, not 
 unfrequently follows the ruin of the gaming- 
 table. Foreigners are more addicted to 
 morning play than are Englishmen. It 
 
 There is no reason for the name being changed ; the 
 practices of the place not having varied in the least 
 since the days of EgaliU^
 
 THE TURF. 39 
 
 would be a curious, though not very agree- 
 able task, to trace the course of gamblers, 
 who prostitute their hours in the morning 
 hells at the for it (T Orleans^ then snatch a 
 hasty dinner in the vicinity, and finally re- 
 turn to these low tripots, or attend the 
 deeper and more dangerous Erebus of the 
 Salon. 
 
 We must not conclude this chapter on 
 Parisian gaming-houses, without giving de- 
 served praise to the author of " Ecarte.'* 
 His details are at once amusing and true ; 
 and his description of the Sainte Pilagee, is 
 drawn to the very life. Let us hope that 
 our countrymen may escape personal know- 
 ledge of it.
 
 40 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Adieu, thou dreary pile ! 
 
 OLD SONG. 
 
 Liberty ! thou art one of the greatest 
 blessings, bestowed on man. To a Briton 
 thou art doubly dear. The world would be a 
 prison to him if liberty of thought, speech, 
 opinion, and person, were not allowed him. 
 We will not, therefore, permit the Saint Pi- 
 lagee to arrest our attention longer, but 
 speed on with our journey and our novel 
 together. 
 
 We have tarried long enough with Lord
 
 THE TURF. 41 
 
 Dorimont on the Continent, and it is time 
 we should return home. This, however, would 
 not have taken place had it not been for an 
 event, not unforeseen, but uncertain as to the 
 period of its occurring. Lord Dorimont had 
 a rich uncle, who had buried himself alive in 
 Leicestershire, and, after being deprived of 
 the sports of the field, from frequent attacks 
 of the gout, and rather frightened by a fall 
 when in the decline of hfe, as he was taking 
 a fence, had determined to do all in his 
 power to attain longevity " not giving his 
 heirs a chance," as his nephew often termed 
 it. By dint of extreme care, an assiduous 
 surgeon, a rosy corpulent house-keeper, good 
 wine, and the stimulus of brandy when re- 
 quired, he continued to make life's taper last 
 much longer than was anticipated, so that 
 he only " slipped his wind" in the tenth 
 year of his nephew's absence. 
 
 Lord Dorimont had the prudence to refrain 
 from raising money on his expectances, so
 
 42 THE TURF. 
 
 that he was now once more a rich man. His 
 own remaining property had greatly improved, 
 which, added to this second accession of wealth, 
 set him up again in the first style ; his expe- 
 rience, at the same time, was almost a third 
 fortune to him. 
 
 With all these advantages he started again, 
 and although he felt some regret in leaving Pa- 
 ris, yet the bright prospect before him, and a 
 kind of maladie du pays to which a Briton 
 is subject, overbalanced the pain, and he made 
 the necessary preparations for turning his face 
 to old England once more. 
 
 His was no escape at night, no slipping of 
 cable on a Sunday, nor departing pitifully 
 par la diligence ; he took leave of his numer- 
 ous acquaintance, paid all his bills, and set 
 forth in a manner becoming his rank and for- 
 tune, and in that of a man of fashion returning 
 with countless articles of ornament and ex- 
 pense of Voxision fahrique. Travelling with 
 the utmost rapidity, he halted only one day
 
 THE TURF. 43 
 
 at Boulogne; and this was not on account of 
 the attractions of the place, but caused by its 
 being necessary to make some repairs to one 
 of his carriages. 
 
 Boulogne has become a complete English 
 colony, where idlers and debtors, delinquents 
 and reduced dandies, alike strut out their 
 hour. It is a kind of stepping-stone to Paris 
 for some, a mezzo termini to others, who con- 
 sider that they have travelled and seen France 
 when they have passed a few winters at this 
 scene of alternate plunder and privation, to 
 both of which our unfortunate countrymen 
 are by turns subjected. The merchant and 
 trader here finds French education for his 
 city-breed, cheap and easy, and this affords 
 him a facility of slipping over from time to 
 time to take the air, or airs of France. 
 Here, too, men in difficulties can corre- 
 spond privately wiih agent and solicitor, 
 negociating with dun and tradesmen. The 
 half pay officer contemplates here an eco-
 
 44 THE TURF. 
 
 nomical existence, mingled with pleasura- 
 ble enjoyment, but finds himself disap- 
 pointed; he begins by counting without his 
 host, and ends by being told out; time is 
 called, and he finds himself placed so as not 
 to be able to come to time. There are some 
 who make of Boulogne a watering-place. 
 This is the best view of it ; in every other 
 form it is a vile medium between France and 
 England. 
 
 Notwithstanding all this, a certain mover 
 in high life, who kept up the Ball at home 
 in great style, and who took from the thea- 
 trical boards a sylph-like performer of much 
 notoriety, pitched his tent here, and affected 
 to live quietly, with all his former expensive 
 habits unaltered. Lord Dorimont had known 
 him in earlier days, and felt pleasure in 
 talking over old times after so long an ab- 
 sence. 
 
 At Calais all is still; the packet is the 
 first thing which a returning traveller looks
 
 THE TURF. 45 
 
 for : " home, sweet home ! " is full in his 
 mind's eye ; and to an heir about to inherit, 
 every moment of delay is marked with impa- 
 tience. It is otherwise to the arriving John 
 Bull, but more particularly to one who is 
 not of the Patrician order, to which novelty 
 applies in vain, and who must look affectedly 
 and insipidly on everything that appertains not 
 to the haut ton, John, of the second, third, 
 and fourth order, has, however, some amuse- 
 ment in an arrival at Calais ; all is new to 
 him ; he swells with importance at thinking 
 that he has begun to see the world, and re- 
 turns, after a glance at the country, full of 
 erroneous opinions, follies and fantasies, or 
 with a deeper rooted prejudice than ever 
 against a nation with which he is wholly un- 
 acquainted. 
 
 Some of these ignorant travellers affect a 
 contempt of the country which they are visit- 
 ing ; and undervalue what they do not un- 
 derstand. We remember a fool exclaiming,
 
 46 THE TURF. 
 
 in the stupidity of his self-conceit, " Here 's 
 a pretty waiter, that don't know what butter'd 
 toast is ! " as if the man was obliged to un- 
 derstand his barbarous French of, Do pang 
 rotte avec du bure. And another, on seeing 
 a fricandeau, asking what it was, " Cest un 
 fricandeau de veau;" replied the waiter. 
 "Oh, you calls that woe,'* rejoined John, "it 
 is woe indeed ! Take it away, it will not do 
 for my palate." 
 
 Our hero cleared the Custom-house, and 
 got quit of the Dover sharks as speedily as 
 possible. A new world seemed before him ; 
 and although he intended to drop many false 
 friends, and to shape a different course to 
 that which he had formerly pursued, yet he 
 meditated again appearing on the turf, and 
 commencing his favourite pursuits; he was 
 aware that low flattery would meet him at 
 every turn, and that fresh plans to lay him 
 under contribution would be formed. But he 
 was proof against both.
 
 THE TURF. 47 
 
 Full of these thoughts, he scarcely knew 
 how the time and distance passed as he lolled 
 in the corner of his travelling-carriage, un- 
 til awaking from his reverie, he was asked 
 where the post-boys should drive ; he paused 
 a moment full of reminiscences, and at length 
 said, " To Stevens's," where his liberal pay- 
 ment of the boys brought him in a very short 
 time. 
 
 No sooner did he appear at the door of the 
 hotel, than the old red-faced waiter. Turner, 
 greeted him with many expressions of respect; 
 he was delighted to see what he called one 
 of the old set. " Times," he said " are 
 sadly altered ; the company is no longer the 
 same." This meant, that they were less ex- 
 pensive; or, rather, did not pay so well. 
 " There is no comparison," added he ; " but 
 how well you look, my lord — how little altered 
 in so long a period of time !" In a word, he 
 never saw a customer with so much pleasure 
 in his life.
 
 48 THE TURF. 
 
 Turner is a waiter tout comme Us autres, 
 but he has his favourites : the new set he 
 swears cannot hold a candle to the old one ; 
 there is more trouble given, and less profit ;' 
 more glasses of water called for than bum- 
 pers of Champaigne ; economy is the order 
 of the day, and the features of affairs are 
 wonderfully altered. 
 
 Lord Dorimont had now recovered a little 
 from his fatigue, whilst his French valet was 
 arranging his splendid dressing apparatus; 
 but after dressing for dinner, he began to feel 
 that solitude was but a sad state at best. 
 However sumptuously a man may dine, gold 
 plate glads not the heart, nor does the gastro- 
 nomic science fill an aching void ; the coffee- 
 room was the only resource, he could there 
 look about him, and might perhaps meet an 
 old friend. 
 
 He accordingly ordered dinner there ; and 
 had scarcely seated himself at table when he 
 recognised his old friend Lord Malmsley, the
 
 THE TURF. 49 
 
 only remaining one of a set of real good 
 fellows; he found him unaltered and unal- 
 terable. He was a veteran in the court of 
 Bacchus ; but was vigorous and rosy at the 
 festive board as when in the flower of youth. 
 
 Mutual satisfaction marked each counte- 
 nance, and they agreed to join company and 
 dine at the same table ; and now Mr. Scott 
 came forward with his adjusted features and 
 cold freezing countenance, bearing a wel- 
 come and bringing his best Champaign and 
 other choice wines, which went off succes- 
 sively and rapidly, to the great delight of 
 the attendants, who began to think that the 
 Golden Age had returned, the Silver one and 
 that of Brass having succeeded in their turn. 
 
 The two friends now run over the list of 
 good fellows, dead, ruined, and removed ; and 
 of the new faces which smiled in their place. 
 Turf transactions next occupied their con- 
 versation, and presented vicissitudes similar 
 to those in every other scene of life ; beggars 
 
 VOL. 1. E
 
 50 THE TURF. 
 
 were literally riding on horseback, and wan- 
 dering nobles walking on foot; dismounted 
 dragoons had retreated to the continent, and 
 counterfeit militaires were filling their place 
 at home. 
 
 The wine went round; and with it their 
 glances at the surrounding company. The 
 whole circle was unknown to the returned 
 traveller; but the right honourable veteran 
 was, as always, acquainted with the whole of 
 the town. He pointed out many of the 
 fashionables of the day to Lord Dorimont; 
 and as he found out that he was resolved to 
 re-embark in the usual way, and enjoy the 
 delights of the Turf once more, he offered to 
 introduce him to a few fellows worth know- 
 ing, and to one in particular who might be his 
 Cicerone in a new world, or rather we ought 
 to say, his guide to re-conduct him to paths 
 which he had long and often trodden, but 
 which were now frequented and occupied by 
 other passengers.
 
 THE TURF. 51 
 
 A young sprig of fashion, sitting at a 
 neighbouring table and sipping his pint of 
 claret, was the man in view : good nature, 
 high dress, an entree to the best society, and 
 a stylish appearance, fitted him for the task; 
 and on being introduced by his friend the 
 Peer, his manners and habits were quite con- 
 genial to those of the retourne ; another ad- 
 vantage was, his being an inmate in the 
 house, which gave a facility to a growing in- 
 timacy, and prevented the trouble of seeking 
 further for an arm-companion, a huge con- 
 venience to a dandy or an exquisite, and in 
 fact to any one wishing to stand high in 
 public opinion. The companion, or tiger, is 
 the introductive to all acceptable visitors, and 
 an impediment to all improper intruders; 
 but what was more valuable than all this, was 
 that the guide was a young man of fortune 
 and independence, so that when he gave his 
 society, his sympathies were likely to accom- 
 E 2
 
 52 THE TURF. 
 
 pany it ; and where he devoted his time, cor- 
 responding feelings must guide his choice. 
 
 The night was far advanced when the 
 friendly and festive triumvirate separated; 
 the worthy Peer with the rose of Bacchus 
 blooming on his well-tempered countenance, 
 the young noble well pleased with renewing 
 one valuable companion, and having found 
 another of less advanced years who could re- 
 introduce him into those places of gay resort 
 in which he had formerly shone. 
 
 With these ideas the new friends separated 
 for the night, or rather for the morning, 
 arranging previously to meet at breakfast, 
 and to sally forth together in the ordinary 
 routine of a fashionable afternoon. Lord Do- 
 rimont slept well ; but ever and anon awoke 
 with the anticipations of future celebrity, of 
 again gaining an eminence in pleasurable life, 
 of doing on the Turf that which he had left 
 vmdone, and of guarding against the snares 
 into which he had fallen, although he rose
 
 THE TURF. 53 
 
 therefrom with dignity, unvanquished and 
 uncomplaining. He had a large disposable 
 force in a pecuniary way, a fine material to 
 open his campaign ; and as V argent, V ar- 
 gent, et toujours de V argent forms the main 
 spring of war, so does it procure all the 
 necessary auxiliaries for fashionable pre-emi- 
 nence and enjoyment. He had nothing to 
 do but write to his steward for a very consi- 
 derable sum of rents due, besides having a 
 great ready money deposit in his late uncle's 
 banker's hands, and the stocks as a further 
 reserve in case of necessity. 
 
 Such a state of things would welcome him 
 everywhere; and would insure him what he 
 met with at all hands, congratulating ac- 
 quaintance, soi-disant friends, kind welcomes, 
 officious and obsequious tradesmen. Nor 
 were these ideas the only ones which inter- 
 vened between waking and repose. Remem- 
 brances of a softer nature presented them- 
 selves on his pillow: there was a certain
 
 54 THE TURF. 
 
 somebody who towered above all other fair 
 favourites, a star of peculiar brightness which 
 outshone the others composing the galaxy of 
 beauty which illumined his faith in le champ 
 de Venus. She was not, as others were, 
 a willing captive, half seeking and half 
 sought, half flying and half lingering by the 
 way ; no Galatea, no fashionable Pyrrha, no 
 well-known mistress of arts and hearts, no 
 honourable or right honourable demirep of 
 distinction. She was one on whose cheek 
 the modest blush of innocence bloomed with 
 superior lustre, one whose retiring softness 
 captivated whilst it commanded respect, and 
 whose full blue-eye, beaming benevolence and 
 love, enchanted and allured at the same mo- 
 ment, and, like the azure vault of Heaven, 
 was distant and serene. Never was more 
 beauty blended in human form, nor more 
 goodness made up in mortal mould. To see 
 her was to admire her, to know her was to 
 love her; the eye of admiration met her
 
 THE TURF. 55 
 
 everywhere, the arts of seduction pursued her 
 at every turn. 
 
 Such a conquest raised the ambition of our 
 young hero to the highest pitch of anxious 
 enterprise ; she was a young bride, sold by 
 the sordid interest and aspiring views of her 
 depraved father to age and dissipation — a 
 wasted heart and vicious mind, in the person 
 of one of la haute noblesse, supported by 
 court favour and bolstered up by royal in- 
 fluence. Unworthy of the jewel he won, not 
 wore, he soon showed symptoms of neglect 
 and indifference : his pride first led him to 
 produce her in all brilliant circles, to exhibit 
 the slave of his caprice, the victim of self- 
 interest. What could be expected ? Disgust, 
 alienation, a withdrawal from his odious pre- 
 sence ; whilst he on his part endeavoured to 
 indulge in the excitements of guilty pleasure, 
 and to acquire the fame of a man of gal- 
 lantry, under the repulsiveness of standing 
 the living wreck and ruin of folly, vice, inso-
 
 56 THE TURF. 
 
 lence, and voluptuousness. A separation was 
 soon suggested ; but as he received a diplo- 
 matic mission to a far distant court, it was 
 not carried into effect; she therefore re- 
 mained a married widow, a titled deserted 
 one, unprotected and unbefriended, and (if 
 we may use the term) exposed to many temp- 
 tations, yet bound by the tyrannical bonds of 
 a galling and preposterous chain. 
 
 Her's was a hard part to play, a hard fate 
 to endure; the dove of gentleness was in the 
 forest of birds of prey. Her rank com- 
 manded her to move in a certain sphere ; re- 
 tirement and solitude were the only probable 
 means of saving her from ruin. Accus- 
 tomed to the language of flattery, it had no 
 effect on her ; chaste by nature and habit, the 
 sensitive plant shrunk not more tremulously 
 from the advance. It seemed as if no motive 
 could win her from virtue's path, yet time 
 and circumstances, neglect and erring nature, 
 at length entangled her in guilty toils. She
 
 THE TURF. 57 
 
 became a fallen star: how and when our 
 reader has still to learn. 
 
 This was the fair one who became the 
 adorata of our hero, and whose absence he re- 
 gretted in the sleepless hours of reminiscence. 
 They had parted as lovers do: their union 
 was attended with all that mystery and hien- 
 seance which marked polished life, but they 
 felt that if fate and propriety divided them, 
 a mutual penchant drew them to each other. 
 They could not ostensibly combine, yet they 
 could not live asunder : — of this hereafter. 
 
 The lateness of the hour, the attending 
 valet, the anticipations of the Turf and town 
 notoriety, drove the remembrance of the 
 enchantress out of her lover's brain for a 
 while, though not without resolving to write 
 to her the first post-day to solicit her to come 
 to England, a circumstance which would add 
 to his eclat, but which he scarcely dared to 
 hope for.
 
 58 THE TURF. 
 
 After a careful toilet, he met his friend at 
 the breakfast-table, perusing over a lengthy 
 article of crim, con. ; on perceiving which, 
 Lord Dorimont smiled and shook his head 
 at the same moment — (was there much in 
 that?) "Shake not thy curly locks at me; 
 thou can*st not say I did it ! " exclaimed his 
 Lordship ; at which the companion laughed 
 heartily and called for breakfast. 
 
 And now a neat team appears at the door 
 in attendance ; its style was quite comme il 
 favt, all well appointed. This pleased his 
 Lordship, whilst it decided him in purchas- 
 ing one that would eclipse it; and maintain- 
 ing a racing and hunting stud equal to those 
 with which he had found it necessary to 
 part. 
 
 The new friends prepared for the morning 
 arrangements. It was Monday ; and Tatter- 
 sail's was the order of the day. After the 
 morning's work there, they had a round
 
 THE TURF. 59 
 
 of horse dealers and coachmakers to make, to 
 pick and choose the finest horses, best and 
 neatest carriages. 
 
 On their way to Tattersall's, Lord Dori- 
 mont's new friend met with a brother drags- 
 man, Lord Starborough, who exhibited strong 
 marks of a family alliance with General 
 Jacko, the celebrated monkey. Dame Na- 
 ture certainly must have left his Lordship to 
 one of her journeymen to make, who has not 
 made him well; nevertheless he is a great 
 amateur of beauty, and has engaged the 
 smiles of more than one fair protegee. He 
 had at one time hanging on his right honour- 
 able arms Lovey and Dovey, and la Colombe 
 was not merely a bird of passage; he had also 
 another Danae, for the Peer is obliged like 
 Jupiter to shower his favours in the same way 
 (we had almost said in the same coin). These 
 impressions cannot be lasting; and it was said 
 of him by a certain frail one, that however a
 
 60 THE TURF. 
 
 woman might fancy herself in love, " look in 
 his face and you '11 forget it all." 
 
 It would be well also for our brother whip, 
 if in the wanderings of his fancy by land and 
 water, he could sacrifice less copiously to 
 Bacchus, for when he comes ashore, three 
 sheets in the windy he is a troublesome cus- 
 tomer to the guardians of the night, and to 
 the peaceable night-walking plebs ; and on 
 board his vessel he is not much steadier. Else 
 how came his faithful friend to fall over- 
 board, and how comes his Lordship to be so 
 fightable (no, not figh table, but threatening) 
 when brought to, and searched on suspicion 
 of bringing some extraordinary productions 
 of foreign parts, or some contraband article 
 smuggled from a show. Indeed, what with 
 beard, and all other external peculiarities of 
 his person, it would puzzle a conjuror to 
 ascertain his genus, not genius, — whether Jew, 
 gentile, smuggler, coachman, noble, or pie-
 
 THE TURF. 61 
 
 bian. Lord Dorimont recollected him when 
 young and unmeaning, but he found him not 
 improved in any shape. 
 
 Arrived at Tattersall's, the new comer, or 
 rather the great unknown returned under 
 such happy circumstances, caused a great 
 effect: how many hoped and expected to reap 
 a golden harvest once more ! Dandies, dealers, 
 jockies, legs, tradesmen, and loungers, were 
 all on the alert, from Hookey, of Goldfinch- 
 Hall, down to the lowest groom-porter of the 
 minor tartarian regions, and from the patri- 
 cian patrons of the turf, down to him who 
 had no horse in his stable. 
 
 And now the odds of the next Derby were 
 settling, books opening, and bets being enter- 
 ed, which set the principal turfmen in motion, 
 as well as those who were actively employed 
 and actually run their own horses, as the 
 betters and partners, known and unknown, of 
 the former.
 
 62 THE TURF. 
 
 Lord Dorimont's friend, in showing the lions, 
 and giving an account of the numerous changes 
 which had taken place ; marked with regret 
 many who had been so fleeced as to be fallen 
 from " their high estate," and now playing a 
 little game, or hanging on from habit; of 
 these Sir Charles Hazard was one, he had 
 in a few years lost a fine fortune to Greeks 
 and legs of all descriptions ; no small portion 
 of which was wrecked at Hookey 's Hall in 
 the West. Sir Charles is now content as a 
 Sub of Dragoons, and views with placid eye 
 the success of those who are literally trading 
 with his money in their pockets: by the 
 way, what a lucky dog that Hookey is ! but 
 how can he be otherwise? he says it's all fish 
 that comes to his dish : and dished they are 
 properly ! 
 
 At the moment Lord Dorimont was expres- 
 sing his regrets at the change of fortune in 
 the bold dragoon. Hookey passed by in pro-
 
 THE TURF. 63 
 
 pria persona : our hero did not immediately 
 recognise him, but his usual address in the 
 vulgar tongue, and his common expression of 
 " Vat, are you here again. Lord Dorimont?" 
 brought him back to his remembrance. Near 
 him stood Pugil, an ex-boxer, well-known 
 in his day in the ring, but who now devotes 
 his time to the turf, and has amassed an im- 
 mense fortune: he has made a better hand of 
 this than his pugilistic trade, and has floored 
 his men more triumphantly than when on the 
 first stage of life, where he appeared and 
 gained a certain portion of notoriety. Doubt- 
 less, he has learned from both " that the race is 
 not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong;" 
 but that " knowledge is power," and money 
 strength. 
 
 Near Hookey, Jerry Mace located himself: 
 this worthy is a quondam groom-porter at a 
 certain house of Grecian name ; the com- 
 mencement of his fortune was from a chance 
 at Pharo, given him by a certain Yorkshire
 
 64 THE TURF. 
 
 baronet, Sir Charles Wheeler. Thus does for- 
 tune's wheel go round: it took a lucky turn 
 in favour of Mace, who now is a prosperous 
 man on the turf, and has turned his back on 
 the club and coffee-house, receiving his dues 
 for a back hand, and all the other offices 
 of waiter and referee : he has not, however, 
 quite forgotten the main chance, and takes 
 care to make his bets where certain to be 
 paid. 
 
 The low origin of Fortune's favourites must 
 astonish a novice, but it does not seem strange 
 to old stagers like Pugil ; nevertheless, if a 
 man had the pedigree of the performances at 
 TattersalFs and the turf before him, they 
 would display a most masqueradish appear- 
 ance; fishmongers, waiters, footmen, dealers, 
 broken tradesmen, and reduced gentlemen — 
 what a motley group. 
 
 One, who was " waiting gentleman to a 
 fine lady," alias a regular hired footman, 
 now carries his head high ; we shall call him
 
 THE TURF. 65 
 
 Nightshade, the name is not unlike it ; this 
 lucky adventurer, who once stood behind a 
 chair, may, perhaps, some day stand for a 
 town or county; he has already purchased an 
 estate in the north, and not long ago won a 
 very large stake, conjointly with Pugil and 
 Shrewd,* a knowing man on the turf. Little 
 did her ladyship think how great a man her 
 lacquey would be; but money levels every 
 rank, and when the aristocracy of the coun- 
 try will step out of their place to gamble 
 promiscuously, whether on the turf or the 
 gaming-table, master and John, the footman 
 and the nobleman, are on a footing. 
 
 As a further proof of this assertion. Blaze, 
 
 * Shrewd, so called from a sort of natural cunning, 
 more profitable in his present line than talent, wit, 
 genius, or open dealing. Shrewd was formerly a quill- 
 driver in a public office not a hundred miles from the 
 Strand ; he now opens his hook in a larger field, and 
 finds that schemes and combinations on the turf beat 
 all calculations, and bring Cocker to Zero. 
 
 VOL. I. F
 
 66 THE TURF. 
 
 formerly a little stable-keeper, was standing 
 by, and conversing familiarly with, a Lord, 
 whose name has been handed down to poste- 
 rity, as famous for its antiquity and rank 
 among men of letters, his noble ancestor 
 having been a star of his day, and the very 
 mirror of a polished nobleman. 
 
 On the other side, was Tim O'Botherim, 
 of the turf and town notoriety : there were 
 also in this mixture of the turpis honesto, the 
 Lord Stormer, a nobleman saris tache on 
 and off the turf, always and every where; 
 and a certain Duke's uncle of immense 
 nones . we know not if he is " cavendo ttitus" 
 but he stands a bright example what a 
 nobleman ought to be on the turf, namely 
 the patron of the sportinsj world, the en- 
 courager of the breed oi iiorses, the pro- 
 moter of pleasure, expense, magnificence at 
 the races, the pattern of noble dealing, and 
 the patriot in contributing to our national 
 amusements.
 
 THE TURF. 67 
 
 Lord Dorimont was now surrounded by a 
 number of persons well acquainted with his 
 lurf-cicerone ; some formerly knew the Peer 
 aimself ; others were acquainted with his cha- 
 racter only, which stood high, and with the 
 report of his second fortune which still more 
 claimed their notice and attention. They 
 were all anxious to get bets with him on the 
 approaching Derby and Newmarket stakes, 
 in which a few succeeded, Lord Dorimont 
 wishing to open a book once again. 
 
 His friend now had an opportunity of in- 
 troducing him to his friends Lord Arden and 
 Letterfield (we name the latter so because his 
 name stands high in the field of literature, not 
 for his personal acquirements but for those of 
 his progenitor, and quifacitper alterumfacit 
 per sej. The first of these Peers has conside- 
 rable talent in more ways than one ; the se- 
 cond dreams occasionally of love and of 
 winning money, — the former he does en gros 
 et en detail ; the latter is all in detail, although 
 f2
 
 68 THE TURF. 
 
 his losses are en gros, not entirely at Hockey's, 
 but at private play, where it is roundly as- 
 serted that he has lost cfSO, 000: his friend 
 already alluded to can, however, decide the 
 truth or falsehood of this. Poor Letterfield ! 
 he seemed in a flat key on the morning of his 
 introduction to the returned nobleman. Could 
 not Mrs. L. (by Mrs. L. we mean elle seule) put 
 him in better tune ? " Homsever" as Hookey 
 says, his Lordship is always kind, easy, and 
 goodnatured. The introduction produced 
 mutual satisfaction to both parties, as also an 
 invitation on the part of his Lordship to share 
 the hospitality of his house, and a proposal to 
 have Lord Dorimont balloted for at Gold- 
 finch Hall : both of which were accepted. 
 
 Amongst other frequenters of Tattersall's 
 was Lord Freely, a well-known character on 
 the turf. This nobleman, at the age of 
 twenty-one years, came into a very fine for- 
 tune, fine estates, and other valuable pro- 
 perty, and no man could have entered life
 
 THE TURF. 69 
 
 with more eclat, had he not at a very early age 
 been a mark for designing wretches who prey 
 upon the young and artless, and, like the pa- 
 rasitical plants which cling round the tree, 
 sapping its substance and living upon its 
 vitality, feed upon the affluent heir, and ex' 
 haust his fortune. One of his earliest friend- 
 ships was that which he formed for the worth- 
 less Lord Scudamore, with whom he was 
 extremely intimate, and who made him pay 
 dearly for his acquaintance. Not content 
 with fleecing him by every other means, a 
 successful conspiracy was got up between this 
 honourable peer and his immaculate lady, 
 by which the credulous friend was found in 
 her Ladyship *s apartment. On the question 
 being asked of "What's to be done? " the gentle 
 dame replied, " You know the man ; " which 
 indeed he did to his cost, and the safest and 
 most prudent step was considered to be writing 
 out a cheque on his Lordship's banker for ten 
 thousand pounds.
 
 70 THE TURfJ 
 
 Lord Freely made some noise on the 
 turf; he had fine horses, was a good judge 
 of them, and must have won considerably 
 had he had fair play; but from the sys- 
 tem of iniquity now practised, money, that is 
 to say bribery, carries every thing before it. 
 Like the Yellow Hussards of the Emperor 
 of Germany, those invisible resources are let 
 out when least suspected, and turn the scale 
 of success when victory is anticipated. Lord 
 Freely in spite of all his losses has persevered 
 in one honourable straightforward line; he had 
 not, like many of his contemporaries, passed 
 from a dupe to a rogue, and retrieved his 
 losses by parting with his honour, and by 
 turning to account the dearly purchased les- 
 sons of iniquity which have been practised 
 upon him. 
 
 If such men as Freely, as the Lord of the 
 Devonshire family, and Lord Eglemount, con- 
 ducted the affairs of the Turf, there would be, 
 as it was intended to be, a field of fair play, an
 
 THE TURF. 7] 
 
 honourable national amusement, and a means 
 of keeping up the finest and fleetest breed of 
 horses in the world ; but, like the Ring, it is 
 prostituted to the vilest purposes, and has 
 become a source of wealth to the lowest of 
 the low ; to legs, jockies, hell-keepers, and pu- 
 gilists, whom we daily see raised from obscu- 
 rity and low life into riches and luxury. There 
 is as little fair play in one as there is true 
 courage in the other, and it is equally unsafe 
 to back either horse or man. 
 
 Near Lord Freely stood Lord De Ville 
 he was one of a party consulting together, or 
 rather asking, and requiring his opinion on 
 some disputed point on the turf. My Lord 
 is almost the only man of rank, who has any 
 chance with the legs, or who can compete with 
 them in any shape. Early habits of pains- 
 taking, a kind of industry, and the watching 
 of events has given him an ascendancy over 
 even many of the old hands. Early in life he 
 was a bold and judicious rider; his hunting-
 
 72 THE TURF. 
 
 Stud was one of a very superior kind ; he sold 
 his horses at very high prices, and was as 
 anxious to pick up an honest penny as the 
 most determined and indefatigable dealer. 
 By this means he always kept up a handsome 
 establishment, although his means were few 
 at starting on the turf. In fact he has accu- 
 mulated a fortune by marriage and industry. 
 In many instances he has been too much for 
 the herd of legs that disgraces and infests the 
 turf, although they are unwilling to acknow- 
 ledge the fact. 
 
 Thus much good ought to be recorded of 
 Lord De Ville. We wish we could add that he 
 possesses as much gratitude or prudence, and 
 had been as liberal to a certain sporting Ba- 
 ronet, whose friendship and worth he well 
 knows, as the latter was kind and serviceable 
 to him. One good turn deserves another ; but 
 we seldom meet with reciprocity of good 
 offices with turf and play men. The love of 
 money corrodes the heart, destroys its best
 
 THE TURF. 73 
 
 feelings, and makes men callous to those 
 sympathies which they otherwise would have 
 cherished: to take care of self is the mainspring 
 of all their actions; indeed any other conduct 
 would be ridiculed. Yet this should not be 
 carried to a total forgetful ness of benefits re- 
 ceived, as in the present instance. 
 
 A nod was here exchanged between the 
 noble lord and Tom Cornhill, a Corinthian 
 of considerable fortune. Tom is a deep old 
 file, as the jockies call him; as wide awake as 
 any body : the story of his horse Leader will 
 not be easily forgotten. Tom kindly told all 
 his friends that the horse was certain to win ; 
 he was well aware he was not worth a shil- 
 ling ; nevertheless, upon such good authority 
 as Tom's he was backed strong for the Derby, 
 and was dead beat. It would be superfluous 
 to ask which w^ay his Honour laid his money. 
 A great panic was struck by this event, but 
 we shall have to record a greater bye and bye. 
 A great many bets were taken, and much
 
 74 THE TURF. 
 
 money won on this occasion, by what is 
 called the flags. These flags, alias out- 
 riders, form a herd of brokendown gentle- 
 men, not worth a shilling, who make bets 
 with the young and unwary, and bet thou- 
 sands as blinds amongst themselves. Thus 
 they pick up a good living ; for if the race 
 comes off right, the unfortunate dupe pays for 
 it, and the outriders are most conspicuous, 
 and what they call up in their stirrups : if 
 otherwise, they disappear for a short time, 
 until their victims are cleaned out, or have de- 
 scended to the same low shifts as themselves. 
 These worthies are bolstered up and em- 
 ployed by the higher legs, to act for them in 
 their robberies where they do not wish to ap- 
 pear themselves. Thus the chances are all in 
 favour of the flags ; for if they win they pocket 
 the coin, and if they lose levant for a time : 
 nay, should any of their dupes be unable to 
 pay, they swell the report of the debt from 
 hundreds to thousands, and account for their
 
 THE TURF. To 
 
 own deficiencies by iheir great losses. This 
 herd of wretches merits exposure, but the 
 greater number are too well known at the 
 Tun and St, James's Street to mention their 
 names. 
 
 Towards the close of the bustle at TattersalPs 
 our hero met with his old trainer Nicholson, 
 which he rather considered as a lucky rencontre, 
 as he informed him that the stud of a deceased 
 nobleman with whom he had lived was to be dis- 
 posed of on the following Monday, and that he 
 could of course give him better information on 
 the subject than any one, knowing as he did 
 the qualities and capabilities of all the horses. 
 
 As Lord Dorimont had now determined 
 on starting once more on the turf, he engaged 
 Nicholson, who recommended his old master 
 to purchase some of the three-year-olds, two 
 of which, in particular, were engaged in some 
 stakes at Newmarket and the ensuing Derby. 
 Nor was this all the advice he gave to his 
 employer ; he let him into a great many of
 
 T6 THE TURF. 1 
 
 the transactions of the day, and detailed a 
 number of anecdotes which astonished a 
 sporting man of the old school. 
 
 " You will not find the turf what it used 
 to be,*' respectfully observed the able trainer. 
 * ' You must be careful about what you are doing : 
 judgment is no longer of use, nor is it at all 
 safe to bet upon any horse. It is no longer as 
 it used to be; men, not horses, make the 
 race ; things are come to a bad pitch, and it 
 is now regulated that the winner is the man 
 and not the horse. There are two parties of 
 legs who make what horses they please win ; 
 and these are two-legged, not four-legged>\ 
 animals" (his lordship laughed). "Bribery 
 and corruption are the order of the day. You 
 will be astonished when I tell you that Cramp, 
 the jockey, has purchased a considerable es- 
 tate in Norfolk ; do you think, my lord, that 
 this money came all in the straightforward 
 line ? Bless you, my lord, the jockies now 
 are every thing ; they drink their claret and
 
 THE TURF. 77 
 
 madeira; they are not content with riding 
 for others, but they can now have their own 
 horses, and their own trainers. In one in- 
 stance one brother is proprietor and jockey, 
 the other, trainer and bet taker; this is pretty 
 playing into one another's hands : but that is 
 not all, there is more money often made by 
 losing than by winning, and every thing is un- 
 der the control of the legs, who form what I 
 call the unholy alliance of bribery and corrup- 
 tion." (another laugh). " It will be my duty, 
 my lord, to watch well your interest, which I 
 will do to the best of my ability ; and I be- 
 lieve you always found me faithful. I know 
 all the manoeuvres; who keeps jockies in 
 pay to give regular information, and corre- 
 sponds with them every week, and pays them 
 the same : and when they have done they are 
 just as likely to lose as ever. The man in 
 pay, reports (true or false) the state of the 
 horses — their going in their gallops; the chap- 
 ter of accidents; cold; lameness; the pro-
 
 78 THE TURF. 
 
 gress of betting ; the favourites of the day ; 
 changes and reports, and the chit-chat of the 
 stable. ' Such and such a horse is hkely to 
 win, because he is backed strong by such a 
 party, who are too good judges to throw 
 away their money ;' or ' such a one has a great 
 notion of such a horse, and I always go by 
 his opinion.' Well, all that is stuff; the day 
 comes, and the supposed knowing one is 
 floored : the combination, the money interest, 
 carry the day. All the rest is moonshine." 
 
 Here ended the trainer's remarks, as wise 
 as true, and his master resolved to profit by 
 them ; he purchased the two three-year-olds, 
 the one for twelve hundred, the other for 
 eight hundred guineas, on the following Mon- 
 day, and sent his trainer with them to New- 
 market. 
 
 But to return to Tattersall's ; the business 
 of the day being over, the two friends drove 
 off to a number of horse-dealers and coach- 
 makers. Lord Dorimont having purchased
 
 THE TURF. 79 
 
 some hacks and carriage horses, he met with 
 four splendid greys, well matched and in 
 prime condition; likewise two thoroughbred 
 ones, for his own riding. 
 
 How delighted were the old dealers to see 
 an old customer, and the new ones to get so 
 good a paymaster ! they were all obsequious- 
 ness. Such pedigrees were named, such his- 
 tories given of the performances of their horses, 
 that it would have astonished any one unac- 
 quainted with this necessary kind of thing for 
 keeping up the prices of their stable. 
 
 Amongst those who were very glad to see 
 Lord Dorimont back again, were the fashion- 
 able dealers, Elmore, Dyson, Milton, not 
 forgetting Anderson. The profits of horse- 
 dealing are enormous. If good judges, the 
 dealers ought to make great fortunes in a few 
 years : there is no obstacle but the paper 
 currency. A dealer dares not refuse an ac- 
 ceptance ; and if paid, it is the best plan 
 for him, because a young man never looks so
 
 80 THE TURF. 
 
 much to what he is to pay, as to the ready 
 money down, which is so very necessary for 
 many of his pleasures. But unfortunately 
 there is a great deal of bad paper afloat, 
 and there is no making a peer or M. P. 
 pay by force : and again, there is that use- 
 ful Insolvent Act, which young men of family 
 and fashion take with as much composure 
 as a glass of soda-water or Seidlitz's powder. 
 These are the only impediments to the deal- 
 er's retiring with riches. They also complain 
 that the young men now-a-days are too deep, 
 for they deal a little themselves, and have 
 all the tricks of the trade ; many a bold dra- 
 goon keeps his stud upon his traffic. They 
 are all awake at the stable as well as at the table, 
 and if it were not occasionally for a rich boy 
 from school, a minor returned from his tra- 
 vels, or an overgrown fortune, whose posses- 
 sor is too proud or too lazy, to look to his 
 own stud, the trade might be at a standstill. 
 Some of the old hands swear that times are 
 
 I
 
 THE TURF. 81 
 
 dismally altered, and that the bribes to tigers, 
 bear-leaders, jackalls, stud-grooms, =^ and 
 masters of horse to noblemen and men of for- 
 tune, take away half the profits : — " There is 
 no trade which now pays " (say they) " except 
 the ready money venders of blue ruin, the 
 slow poisoners of the people, and quick 
 makers of fortunes for themselves." 
 
 * " How are we ruined ? " — is a question which 
 our noblemen and men of fashion might put to them- 
 selves. Why, the very bribery of dependents and 
 domestics is cause sufficient. They are subsidised to 
 an immense amount by dealers and tradesmen to wink 
 at the frauds practised on their patrons ; nay, even the 
 fair sex often bribe to get introduction, et cetera. 
 
 VOL. 1.
 
 82 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 
 Ingens gloria Teucrum. 
 
 Whilst our hero was flying over the town 
 to purchase carriages and horses, and other 
 articles of expense and elegance, Hookey, 
 the great glory of the two brother crows, 
 was seated betwixt them in his magnificent 
 Pallazo, not a thousand miles from the Re- 
 gent's-park, examining his books, and smiling 
 over the effect of his successful labours. He 
 had a great portion of the peerage on the
 
 THE TURF. 83 
 
 wrong side of his accounts; but some, Hookey 
 said, " were as good as the Bank of Eng- 
 land ; others were bitter bad ones, but must 
 not be affronted.^' A title is a bait to the 
 inexperienced and ambitious : with such fish 
 Hookey baited his hook, and in the end 
 caught by hook or by crook, as pi-ivate ang- 
 lers do, whether by blind hookey or not mat- 
 ters little ; and as the fish is attracted by a 
 feather or a worm, so gaudy names and ap- 
 pearances, and even a worm, if it be a little 
 worm, draws the victim to its lure; a bit of 
 red cloth is not amiss at times, although most 
 successful with the fairer sex. 
 
 Hookey had his book before him, and was 
 amusing himself by repeating the soubriquets of 
 his customers ; his jokes were rather fishy, but 
 the two crows were forced to laugh at them. 
 He went on with his nicknames : Lord Let- 
 terfield he called a flat fish. Lord Arden a 
 g2
 
 84 THE TURF. 
 
 dab, Lord Verity (a peer famous for truth- 
 telling) a flying-fish, the Duke of Alpin a 
 skate, Lord Clan Erin a sword-fish. Lord 
 Freely a good sole; some were gudgeons, 
 some sharks ; players upon a small scale were 
 sprats and minnows, the great stakers were 
 pike and turbot ; where, as Hookey termed 
 it, there was "cut and come again.^^ 
 
 At the end of this great debate and exa- ^jjt 
 mination. Hookey, being complimented for ' 
 the last night's superlative supper, turned 
 his thoughts to those who were next to be in- 
 vited to his splendid board. Lord Dorimont j 
 was marked down with a double X as a 
 prime customer: to him was added some 
 small fry. Hookey has much modesty about 
 him ; and although very deficient in his parts 
 of speech, is never backward to speak up for 
 himself, nor to envite by vord or letter the 
 most illustrious names in the land, amongst ' 
 whom was the young Duke of Deloraine, just 
 
 1
 
 THE TURF. 85 
 
 come into his immense property. This 
 would be no silver fish, but a gold one of the 
 highest price and first magnitude. To him 
 Hookey took the liberty to send an invitation 
 to his hall, the fame of which had gone forth 
 for having (as Lord Verity calls it) hellish 
 gastronomical suppers ; but the young Duke 
 returned the letter with contempt and indig- 
 nation, observing that it was insufferably im- 
 pudent in Hookey, thus to presume to lure 
 him to such a place. Well would it be if all 
 our nobility possessed as much becoming 
 family pride, and had such a proper disgust 
 for play, and for the haunts of Greeks and 
 pigeons. 
 
 While we are on this head we cannot help 
 admiring the sound judgment and elevated 
 feeling of our late most gracious Sovereign, 
 who condemned the frequenters of this East- 
 ern Acheron, and set his face against those 
 who frequented it. With the lustre and dig-
 
 86 
 
 THE TURF. 
 
 nity of a magnanimous, graceful, and muni- 
 ficent Prince, his late lamented Majesty had 
 the good sense and experience of a man of 
 the world; and, to an excellent heart, he 
 added a clear, discerning head. 
 
 The consultation was closed, invitations 
 were issued, all the gastronomic arts were 
 put in requisition to tickle the palate, and the 
 utmost splendour of lights dazzled the sight 
 on the approach of night. The lustre of such 
 displays, the attractions of gorgeous banquets, 
 wines of the first quality exercising their 
 alluring and intoxicating properties on the 
 weak brain, titles and coronets, and the hope 
 held out of gain, mingled with amusement 
 and fashionable society, can turn a Pandemo- 
 nium into a land of promise, teeming with 
 nectar and honey ; the approach is easy and 
 delightful, but the '^ revocare pedem" — there is 
 the difficulty, ought we not rather to say the 
 impossibility; for who goes to such places
 
 THE TURF. 87 
 
 for curiosity merely, sacrifices only what 
 the thing may be worth as a novelty, and 
 quits it when known sufficiently to be 
 avoided? There are men who pretend to 
 make of this place a lounge and a pastime ; 
 but there they deceive either themselves or 
 the public, and ruin is the end of the affair. 
 There are also men under false colours, who 
 act as decoys, or who, having ruined them- 
 selves, are tolerated in the hope of a turn 
 of fortune and a recommendation to friends, 
 and many of these grow as anxious to pro- 
 cure customers as those whose whole occupa- 
 tion is plunder. 
 
 So much for public or club-play ; nor were 
 private professionals less anxious to obtain so 
 valuable an addition as our returned noble- 
 man. Dinners and parties were made for the 
 express purpose of inviting him. Amongst 
 these was an invitation from Lord Clan Erin, 
 a very agreeable nobleman, and who, although
 
 88 THE TURF. 
 
 implicated in a transaction in which a Mr. 
 Oldwether was a prominent and complaining 
 party, came out like gold from the crucible 
 bright, sterling, and proof. By the way, we 
 never thought very highly of the animal above 
 named. Lord Dorimont had now a first-rate 
 set of new acquaintance, a brilliant circle ; as 
 before, a stud ; an entree once more on the 
 turf; he was elected at Goldfinch Hall, and 
 again on the books of the first clubs; and 
 what was more desirable than all this, he had 
 experience, a mature judgment, and a calm- 
 ness which no accident or event could alter : 
 otherwise he must inevitably have become a 
 prey to the Knights of the Golden Fleece, ar- 
 rayed in battle order against him, under 
 the mask of friendship. He had contri- 
 vers and advisers of every calibre; names of 
 winning horses ; suggesters of schemes ; cal- 
 culators of chances at play ; every one wished 
 him to win, but had he listened to their kind
 
 THE TURF. 89 
 
 advices, he would have been " let in,'* as 
 they termed it, deep indeed. 
 
 Well aware of these worthies, he listened to, 
 but rejected their plans, accepting neverthe- 
 less their dinners, and placidly losing small 
 sums at them and at the houses of public play. 
 These losses had no effect either on his temper 
 or his purse ; and whilst they enabled him to 
 pass off his time, and to continue to study 
 men and the transactions of the gaming-table, 
 he was forming plans of future honourable 
 success : he even allowed himself to be played 
 upon, on a small scale; on which he only 
 smiled as in scorn, and from the popularity 
 of his manners gained the good-will of deter- 
 mined gamblers. All this would have been 
 two dull and business-like, had not the relax- 
 ation which the turf affords, together with a 
 little temperate successful vanity, tempered its 
 sameness. 
 
 There was still one thing wanting, and on
 
 90 THE TURF. 
 
 that depended the final arrangement of his 
 establishment ; he was now no longer the 
 butterfly of youth, nor the follower of bonne 
 aventure ; his heart could boast the conquest 
 of a brilliant of the first water ; so that it ap- 
 peared as necessary to his happiness as con- 
 ducive to his notoriety, to engage the Comtesse 
 to join him in town. The arrangement might 
 be made with discrimination and delicacy, 
 and would favour all his other designs, and 
 in the event of her listening to his proposals, 
 he would sojourn at Stevens's, and have a 
 splendid home at her house : thus enjoying 
 the life of a single man and that of happy 
 domestication by turns, all organised in a 
 very superior manner, and so contrived 
 as not to trench on any thing bordering 
 on a want of decorum; mystery, secrecy, 
 and management being as necessary in ama- 
 tory as in diplomatic concerns. He decided, 
 therefore, on pressing her to quit Paris ; paint- 
 
 i?
 
 THE TURF. 91 
 
 ing in glowing colours the agonies of absence, 
 the insufficiency of all other substitutes for 
 the one object which alone can constitute per- 
 fect felicity. 
 
 Lord Dorimont was versed in these descrip- 
 tions; his practised hand could draw florid 
 pictures, and pen letters of fire, and words that 
 breathed. England and the turf had, it is true, 
 rather estranged him from the softer pursuits; 
 but a long sejour abroad ; the practised en- 
 chantments of foreign sorceresses ; the chains 
 which he had imposed on others and around 
 himself— gentle arts which gentle dames in- 
 spire and practice — had made him a very 
 dangerous suitor for female favour. It is in 
 love as at play; the timid novice becomes 
 an amateur, the amateur grows into a pro- 
 fessor, and a professor becomes a master of 
 arts. 
 
 So it was with the enterprising Lord Dori- 
 mont; he, like a certain noble and immortal
 
 92 THE TURF. 
 
 bard now living in our memory, had had his 
 heart withered and ruined by the satiety of 
 conquest, hardened by successive impressions, 
 and corroded by suspicions created by artful 
 women, and directed against the sex in general, 
 than which nothing can be more unjust, mon- 
 strous, and unnatural. He who wishes for true 
 bliss can find it nowhere but with kind and 
 lovely woman; he who looks for faith, con- 
 stancy, gentleness, firm friendship, comfort, 
 tender consolation, ardour of attachment, and 
 heroism in adversity, can meet with them no- 
 where else. These, under other circumstances, 
 would all have centered in the lost Com- 
 tesse ; she was no flirt drawn by superior at- 
 traction from one object to another, such as 
 our hero had often courted and possessed ; she 
 stood admired but invincible ; envied, yet mo- 
 dest in her pre-eminence; and it was for this 
 reason that the ambition of her suitor ren- 
 dered him indefatigable in his arts to win
 
 THE TURF. 93 
 
 her. Every device was resorted to in vain — 
 flattery, romance, presents, poetry, music, 
 eloquence, prayer, and lamentations — all in 
 vain. Fixed melancholy and retirement, the 
 sad adieux of a bleeding heart, a vow never 
 to see her more, moral reflections, intermi- 
 nable regrets, finally, the loss of him whose 
 presence was as dangerous as delightful, 
 undermined her resolution. Her hand was 
 bestowed on another, but her heart was free 
 until then, when it was madly bestowed on 
 our hero. Had not an odious chain fettered 
 her, it would have been happiness the most 
 perfect to have lived in retirement with the 
 friend of her heart. This could not be; 
 we therefore shall abstain from saying what 
 was the tie ; they saw each other daily, their 
 parting was painful ; his Lordship returned to 
 the world : he was all the world to her, the 
 rest was a desert. 
 
 Time rolled on, when one morning brought
 
 94f '•: THE TURF. 
 
 a letter from her lover, full of protestations 
 of unaltered and immutable affection, and 
 praying her to repair to London, to meet one 
 who could no longer live without that smile 
 which was the sunshine of his soul. She 
 might visit England for awhile without sus- 
 picion ; but if she tarried, she must return no 
 more. Here was a painful obstacle: but then 
 her husband was old and dissipated, and the 
 favoured one was unshackled : a circumstance 
 incessantly kept in view by the latter, and 
 an unction which her credulity made her hug 
 to her heart. How many unhappy women 
 treasure up a similar deceitful ray of fond 
 expectation, which only glitters to undo ! the 
 phantom dazzles, until change, cold indiffer- 
 ence, and neglect, destroy the fabric which 
 love and confidence had constructed, or time 
 obliterates those charms which inspired feel- 
 ings that fade and die with them. 
 
 The receipt of this letter threw the Com-
 
 THE TURF. 9$ 
 
 tesse into that state, which hearts rent with 
 affliction, wounded by remorse, and lacerated 
 by sad remembrance, yet half dead to pre- 
 sent agony, and cicatrized by the neutralizing 
 hand of time and absence, keenly feel. She 
 had been his; he had won her; the arts 
 ; which captivated still retained the borrowed 
 graces which gave lustre to them ; that sen- 
 sibility which so successfully imitates virtue ; 
 that devotion w^hich makes one, only, match- 
 less attachment appear spotless to the eye 
 of the beloved; the want which the heart 
 creates of loving and being loved in return; 
 of living but for one, and seeing that one 
 always, in all things ; revived in her bosom, 
 as the brief and fallacious wintry sunbeam 
 revivifies for a time the declining flower, 
 which its distance and coldness had consigned 
 to death. She had parted with Lord Dori- 
 mont under a promise to return again ; but 
 she had considered that that promise was
 
 , ■* 
 
 96 THE TURF. 
 
 rather made in pity than sincerity. Her 
 rank and station in life forbade her to become 
 the mistress (a titre) of any man ; he could 
 not make her his wife; and she had disco- 
 vered of late that the world had more power- * 
 ful attractions for him, than the loveliest and 
 most faithful woman could supply in its 
 place. 
 
 For a time she had shut herself up after 
 his departure. In a little while she received 
 company, and affected to talk of him with 
 the coolness of a sincere well-wisher. " He 
 owed himself to his country." These were 
 her words — " Patriotism was the most pro- 
 minent feature of a Briton ;" she hoped he 
 
 miofht run a race of distinction and fame, and 
 
 . 1 
 
 form an honourable connexion. ^ 
 
 This last phrase she tortured herself to 
 
 rehearse ; in a word, she affected to have lost 
 
 sight of him, except in kind remembrance : 
 
 and what a task is this to a fond female ; to ^
 
 THE TURF. 97 
 
 her whose finely woven sympathies make 
 earth a paradise with a bosom friend ; to her 
 whose hfe is a romance of deeper and more 
 delicate interest than pen can draw, or the 
 most eloquent tongue can tell ! All this she 
 had surmounted, and was now living in that 
 torpid state which agony bequeaths to the 
 object over which it has exercised its cruel 
 agency. She had, it is true, received warm 
 letters from her lover, but she doubted his 
 return to France, and considered her follow- 
 ing him to England as wholly unbecoming of 
 the relative ties which she owed to society, 
 her family, and home ; and here was now a 
 formal proposal to quit them all ; to sojourn 
 in a foreign land, because he who had es- 
 tranged her from her own, from family, from 
 duty, and from herself, could not be happy 
 without her. 
 
 The lover was successful; her heart was 
 like the flower which could only bloom in 
 
 VOL. I. H
 
 98 THE TURF. 
 
 one climate, to which a happy state of wariyith 
 was necessary for its existence. She saw not 
 the consequences, and only considered the 
 happiness of him who brought them on his 
 victim's head ; and without delay or delibera- 
 tion, resolved on abandoning every thing for 
 the dream of delight which was rekindled in 
 her mind. The terms on which she surren- 
 dered her honourable place in society, seemed 
 promising and respectable — a separate esta- 
 blishment, splendour, a veil thrown over the 
 nature of the tie which bound their hearts 
 together, an introduction into a gay and 
 fashionable circle, the outward appearance of 
 friendship only, and the satisfaction of every 
 desire which ambition could procure. 
 
 These were fair forms, but were they ho- 
 nest? Was disinterested love the cause, or 
 pride, or habit ? much of the latter ; but the 
 delusion which affection ever offers to the 
 inflamed imagination, concealed every mo-
 
 THE TURF. 99 
 
 tive but boundless passion from the view of 
 her, who had taken leave of the world, and 
 lived and breathed for one alone. She was 
 decided : and after answering the warm sum- 
 mons, and giving time for the necessary pre- 
 parations for her departure, took leave of her 
 home and country for ever. His lordship met 
 her at Dover, and conducted her to a house 
 and establishment in the very first style of 
 elegance, and she now became, without know- 
 ing it, the victim of her credulity ; yet, satis- 
 fied with seeing daily the object of her ido- 
 latry, her days glided in oblivion, interrupted, 
 however, occasionally by the pang of self- 
 reproach, or by that painful and dejected 
 sensation which guilty pleasure creates, but 
 which we deceive ourselves by calling low 
 spirits, vapours, a nervous affection, the 
 weather, variable climate, constitutional 
 weakness, or any thing but what it is. 
 
 As might be expected. Lord Dorimont was 
 H 2
 
 100 THE TURF. 
 
 assiduously attentive to her on her arrival. 
 She was soon noticed and admired in the 
 Park and at the Theatres; every one was 
 anxious to be acquainted with her ; a splen- 
 did house and good table failed not to gain 
 her, through the introduction of her cavalier, 
 a number oi soi-disant friends. Lord Letter- 
 field was amongst the first presentations, as 
 v/ere Lord Clan Erin, Arden, and Norland, 
 a great amateur of foreign beauty, and who 
 enjoyed the confidence of his royal master, two 
 circumstances which gained him, more than 
 personal merit, a certain degree of popula- 
 rity, and still more of publicity. La belle 
 Comtesse was seen with approving eye by 
 many, but returned no partial corresponding 
 look to any one ; nevertheless her amiability of 
 disposition, graceful person, and courtliness 
 of manners, made friends of those who had 
 designs not purely friendly in their warm 
 attentions.
 
 THE TURF. 101 
 
 All this was a great triumph to his lord- 
 ship : yet such was his steady mind that it 
 led him not away from the joys of the turf, 
 nor diverted his thoughts from great plans of 
 success with which his ideas had long been 
 pregnant: he watched the wheel of incidents; 
 he compared the present with the past — his 
 losses with the causes from which they pro- 
 ceeded ; he placed the gambler of his day 
 with him of to-day ; and, in constant cor- 
 respondence with his trainer, prepared for 
 the events which the race-course might soon 
 exhibit. His love for the Countess was only 
 like the episode of a play, the main plot still 
 occupied his brain ; but like modern sports- 
 men, love and business were attended to 
 tour a tour ; the turf being now a business, 
 like a place at the Court of Chancery, or the 
 Stock Exchange.
 
 102 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 Fortune a goddess is to fools alone. 
 
 The wise are always masters of their own. 
 
 Dryden's Juvenal. 
 
 Pope says that " Man never is, but al- 
 ways to be blest." True : but we may add 
 that woman is in the same predicament. 
 The fair stranger was quite la rage, her 
 parties were delightful, her praises endless, 
 her engagements incessant; but happiness 
 was beyond her reach. The fatigues of plea-
 
 THE TURF. 103 
 
 sure weakened and disordered her, and her 
 lover was so absorbed in the turf, that she 
 detected the decided preference which he 
 gave to its engagements, to the gratification 
 of her society. She sees him mostly in crowds, 
 in entertainments in which the heart takes 
 no part, and in circles presided over by Pride, 
 and rendered uninteresting from the restraint 
 which was imposed on her looks and expres- 
 sions. 
 
 Of the pleasantest parties made for her 
 was one at Letterfield House, and another 
 given by Lord Clan Erin. It was necessary 
 to make returns for these, which the Countess 
 did in a very superior style. At the first 
 party given by the lord of literary ancestry, 
 he introduced a married lady who was the 
 goddess of his idolatry, and who held an 
 empire over him of no small account. We 
 shall have occasion to speak of her hereafter : 
 in the interim suffice it to say that the
 
 104 THE TURF. 
 
 Countess considered her as a very cliarming 
 woman. 
 
 The mind must dwell on something ; that 
 of the fair stranger would fain have fixed on 
 the exclusive society of the bosom friend for 
 whom she had left home and country, and 
 whose splendid offers of a settlement fixed by 
 him, she had generously rejected ; but as 
 Tattersall's and the racing stable, the clubs 
 and private play, a steeple chase and hunting, 
 drew him incessantly from her, she gradually 
 got a taste for play, which formed a part of 
 her amusement after her dinners and soirees ; 
 self-possession prevented her from playing so 
 deep as she otherwise might have done ; for 
 on the one hand she feared lest she might 
 displease or inconvenience him from whom 
 her fortune flowed ; and on the other hand, 
 she had heard many instances in her own 
 country of women being ruined by gam- 
 ing debts, which place not only their pe-»
 
 THE TURF. 105 
 
 cuniary resources but their honour in jeo- 
 pardy. 
 
 Lord Dorimont, ever attentive to her 
 wants, supphed her at the card- table, and 
 deemed her losses as very trifling articles of 
 expenditure. As for his own they were also 
 comparatively small, but led to a number 
 of designs and contrivances formed against 
 him, yet prevented by his coolness, com- 
 posure, and being always alive. We now 
 return to the turf. 
 
 Whilst half-knowing ones were receiving 
 the intelligence of retained grooms, =^ or 
 
 * As a proof of the march of intellect, we have 
 seen the crafty correspondence of a retained informer 
 to a poor gentleman, who being broken down still 
 dabbles and gets deeper into the mire. The racing 
 groom writes an almost illegible hand, but the r.rt of 
 wording it would not disgrace ministerial ingenuity ; 
 and the absence of signature and feigned names of 
 horses and men, are truly characteristic of a spy.
 
 106 THE TURF. 
 
 jockies, Lord Dorimont's faithful trainer was 
 attending the interest of his master. After 
 des tendres adieux, Lord Dorimont goes down 
 to Newmarket, having promised la belle Com- 
 tesse, that she shall witness the pearl of all 
 races ; and, having purchased other horses in 
 addition to his three-year-olds, one, on trial, 
 he found to be a perfect Eclipse, for which 
 reason he named him Premier, founding 
 great expectations on him — perhaps too this 
 name was given in compliment to the greatest 
 captain and statesman of the age. 
 
 Premier, on trial, exceeded the most san- 
 guine expectations of his new owner : he was 
 engaged in the Riddlesworth stakes. Lord 
 Dorimont, after returning to town, and pass- 
 ing a few days with the Countess and in par- j 
 ties given by friends, again repaired to the 
 scene of action, where he met Lord Letter- 
 field, between whom and himself the strictest 
 intimacy was contracted ; the peer becoming
 
 THE TURF. 107 
 
 his confederate on the turf, and backing his 
 lordship's horse to an immense amount. Pre- 
 mier won the Riddlesworth, beating Lord 
 De Ville's horse, and after that stood very 
 high, so that he became a great favourite 
 for the Derby from his performances at the 
 Craven ; and it is but justice to remark he 
 was rode by Cramp, the first rider of the 
 day. Premier advances daily as a favourite 
 and wins the Newmarket stakes, which places 
 him on the top of the list for the Derby, and 
 so encourages Lord Dorimont, that he and 
 his right honourable friend back him for an 
 enormous stake. 
 
 At this crisiS) Nicholson, the faithful ho- 
 nest trainer, which is a rara avis in terris 
 now-a-days, informed his master of a black 
 plot laid against him, and divulged an atro- 
 city of the deepest die. A man, by the name of 
 Sandcrack, was deputed by a junto of the legs 
 to offer a considerable bribe to the trainer to
 
 108 THE TURF. 
 
 dose Premier, by which the confederacy was 
 to win a very large sum of money, and trust- 
 ing to the secrecy of the parties were certain 
 of success; this Sandcrack was once only a 
 common farrier, but having, per fas et nefas^ 
 won a little money, he mounted the ladder of 
 success, and is now become a very great better 
 at almost all the races, nor can it be won- 
 dered at how ill gotten gain is amassed, when 
 we see on the turf and in the ring a system 
 of coldly calculated plunder, and unblushing 
 fraud brazening it out. 
 
 Against such a conspiracy there was but 
 one remedy, and Lord Dorimont, . with the 
 promptness of an able general, resorted to it. 
 He first largely rewarded his faithful servant 
 for his intelligence by letting him into a hand- 
 some share of the future gain; and made him 
 seem to accede to the base proposals. A report 
 is circulated of Premier's being amiss, and the 
 odds, instead of being in his favour, even turn
 
 THE TURF. 109 
 
 and rise against him : at the same time Lord 
 Letterfield and Lord Dorimont keep backing 
 him, and take the odds in all directions; 
 whilst the junto of villainy is overjoyed at the 
 approaching period of their golden harvest. 
 
 Whilst this scene of iniquity is acting by 
 one party of legs, another set of honest fel- 
 lows propose a bribe of some magnitude to 
 Cramp, to make Premier lose. They were 
 ignorant of the physicking plan, and fearful 
 that the report of the horse's being sick might 
 not be depended upon. 
 
 Thus do rogues attack rogues ; but fortu- 
 nately the able trainer gets secret intelligence 
 of this in a clandestine manner, and also of 
 Cramp having accepted the offer; for Ni- 
 cholson had not been idle in the interme- 
 diate space of time, and brother thieves will 
 sometimes peach, or let out their secrets. 
 Liquor and discontent, disappointment or a 
 higher bribe, watching and listening, will
 
 110 THE TURF. 
 
 bring out mighty cjiscoveries, and Nicholson 
 neglected nothing. 
 
 The great day at length arrives, the course 
 is crowded, the weather fine, and. a most 
 brilliant display of beauty and fashion graces 
 the scene. The women are charming, and 
 highly dressed, from the Duchess to the low- 
 est figurante. All are there: lots of sporting 
 men; of the Greeks, a complete phalanx; of 
 the plebeian race, all that could muster a 
 vehicle, from a gig or tilbury, to a tax-cart 
 or donkey-chaise. Then it was curious to ex- 
 amine the phyzogs (as they vulgarly term it) 
 of knowing ones of various descriptions, from 
 the turf-man to the pugilist, ex-grooms, bro- 
 kendown jockies, cock-fighters, retired train- 
 ers, grooms on leave, porters, keepers of 
 little-goes and waiters from hells, together 
 with city sportmen and a tribe of cracksmen 
 and reputed thieves, Jews, bailiffs, and the 
 police. Ye powers, what a medley !
 
 THE TURF. Ill 
 
 Toward the hour for starting, exquisites 
 and titled ruffians, mounted on or in their 
 drags, assemble in numbers ; and now Lord 
 Dorimont appears driving his four greys, 
 followed by the Countess in a splendid equi- 
 page, with her poodle, and a fair companion 
 by her side. The Peer of Letterfield, with 
 eye elate, is not far off; the two friends dash 
 up to the Warren ; the moment for saddling 
 arrives, and Premier comes out as fine as a 
 star, in the first possible condition, spurning 
 the ground beneath him, and proudly snuff- 
 ing the gale. 
 
 " My eyes, vot a hanimal !" cries a cock- 
 ney. " I bets two to von upon him," ex- 
 claims a dog-breaker. " Plesh me, how veil 
 he looks ! " observes a wondering Jew, who had 
 got a bit of money against him. The physick- 
 ing party are astonished, but the other bri- 
 bery party are mad with happy anticipation. 
 Bets are offered in his favour from his ap-
 
 112 THE TURF. 
 
 pearance, at which they eagerly catch ; the 
 Baronet and the Peer put on still more ; 
 ** taken, taken ! " echoes from all around ; 
 whilst pencils and pocket-books are raised in 
 air ; the sums on the race are frightful ; the 
 capitalists launched out to a great extent,* 
 while others borrowed and raised money in 
 all possible ways. 
 
 And now the jockies are weighed. At 
 this moment Cramp makes his appearance, 
 when Lord Dorimont and his right honour- 
 able confederate go up to him, and inform 
 him that he must ride one of my Lord's 
 horses, and that Lord Dorimont will put a 
 boy upon Premier. Cramp swells, colours, 
 turns pale. With anger in his eye, and despair 
 in his heart, he says he must ride the horse ; 
 he can never win if rode by a boy; he has 
 himself a large stake upon him, and all his 
 friends have backed him; it is impossible 
 for the boy to do him justice, and it would
 
 THE TURF. 113 
 
 scarcely be fair to the public that such a 
 race should be spoiled: the consequence would 
 be fatal to many whom he had advised to risk 
 their all upon Premier. 
 
 Our hero's eye tells the betrayer that all 
 is not right; he entreats him to let him 
 mount, but Lord Dorimont is inflexible ; the 
 boy is now in his saddle, and the start is 
 made. The physickers are now faint with fear, 
 and the Cramps look on the boy with ago- 
 nizing trepidation; the jockey's want of skill 
 is their only remote chance of escape; it 
 fails; Cramp rides like an archfiend, but 
 after a desperate struggle, which takes still 
 more money out of the betters' pockets, Pre- 
 mier wins, and the boy is hailed with surprize 
 and rapture by those who were not in the 
 secret of the intended robbery : Lord Dori- 
 mont and his friend shake hands, the former 
 clears twenty thousand by the race, and the 
 latter makes half as much. 
 
 VOL. I. I
 
 114 THE TURF. 
 
 The interest created by this race was almost 
 the highest ever known; the defeat of the legs 
 was indescribable; each plotting party was 
 electrified; the minor plunderers were ruined; 
 two defaulters quitted the course for France; 
 one Greek took to his bed ; the famous jockies 
 slunk off crest-fallen; and mourning presided 
 where entertainments were provided to cele- 
 brate a victory achieved, as many are, by 
 bribery and corruption, perfidy and foul play. 
 
 Small was the triumphant party, but high 
 in spirits and joyous in appearance ; never did 
 Jena or Marengo raise their gallant Con- 
 queror higher than this day's generalship ex- 
 alted the returned nobleman, who from for- 
 merly being a prey had become a formid- 
 able foe ; he was now reverenced and feared, 
 having both the material and other means, as 
 well as the talent to oppose all their cunning 
 and double designs. 
 
 Let us now contemplate the gay scene
 
 THE TLTRF. . 115 
 
 after the race. Victory would lose its best 
 reward were the smile of beauty withdrawn. 
 The ladies were all decidedly in favour of 
 Premier, and cheered by sweet looks his 
 successful proprietor. Lord Dorimont, who 
 was now to his inamorata a second Napo- 
 leon, rode up to her carriage, and received 
 the soft pressure of her glowing palm; Lords 
 Letterfield, Norland, Arden, De Ville, Clan 
 Erin, and Verity, all surrounded the trium- 
 phant car. And now others try to pierce 
 the circle in order to congratulate the great 
 winner ; friends and foes, acquaintances, and 
 those who forced themselves on his notice, all 
 were anxious to felicitate him; the blackest 
 villains there, who were secretly in the medi- 
 tated robbery, all strive to find favour in his 
 sight; compliments, invitations, and saluta-^ 
 tions met him on either hand. 
 
 Elate with success, but worn out with the 
 fatigue of flattery, our hero and his friend 
 I 2
 
 116 THE TURF. 
 
 quit the race-ground, followed as before by 
 the helle Comtesse^ y^ho now seems to reign, 
 and who by this morning's eclat acquires a 
 greater taste than before for gaming of every 
 description; for she had her little share of 
 profits in this mighty race, in which her heart 
 was embarked. Women do nothing by halves ; 
 in love, in hatred, in ruin, or in gain, in the 
 language of the great French author, they 
 may well exclaim, 
 
 '* Je me croirais hai, d'etre aime faiblement/* 
 
 On their road home a host of elegantes paid 
 their passing devoirs to Lord Dorimont and 
 the Comtesse; hung on the carriage windows 
 of la Belle, and shook the hand en passant of 
 Fortune's favoured one ; amongst them there 
 were Captain Pigeoneau and Captain Har- 
 lequino, both turf men, the first a long shot, 
 the other one of the best gentlemen riders in 
 Europe. We shall have to speak of them
 
 THE TURF. 117 
 
 hereafter : at present we will leave the one to 
 his pretty raven-locked partner, and the other 
 to ruin himself in beauty's eyes. The Cap- 
 tain's colours are pink and black ; the rose 
 and the dark eye paint them. A word to the 
 wise. 
 
 At eight o'clock a splendid banquet awaits 
 the winning party ; and more winning than 
 all, the lovely stranger, now lost to home and 
 country, blind to the future, lulled into a gen- 
 tle dream of happiness, and oblivious of every 
 thing but the present hour. At a very early 
 hour in the morning the friends take their 
 road home, the one to Stevens's, the other to 
 somewhere near Park-lane, or perhaps took a 
 turn out of his way : one good turn deserves 
 another, and it is a long lane that has never 
 a turn. 
 
 The great winner, like the great unknown, 
 grew ambitious from success, and fonder of 
 money from the possession of it ; all seemed
 
 118 THE TURF. 
 
 now to thrive with him ; the turf more than 
 ever invited him to its profits and dehghts ; 
 he had a treasure in his trainer, to whom he 
 was not ungrateful ; and he had a pretty good 
 lesson from the frustrated villany of the legs 
 to put him on his guard for the future. 
 
 He was now determined to push his luck, 
 and formed grand schemes for aggrandisement 
 both on and off the turf, which weight of 
 metal, his lessons on the continent, and con- 
 stant watchfulness would in time achieve. 
 Not content with a second fortune be- 
 queathed him by his uncle, he resolved to 
 create a third, and to become enormously 
 rich, in which anticipation the provision for 
 the Countess was not forgotten. This she 
 doubly deserved from her noble, disinterested 
 conduct. 
 
 He was now a great favourite on the town 
 as well as on the turf, but at the same time a 
 mark for imposition and for adulation ; artists
 
 THE TURF. 119 
 
 and tradesmen annoyed him to impertinence ; 
 plans for ornamenting his country mansions 
 were submitted to his examination ; proposals 
 to beautify his grounds; solicitations to pa- 
 tronize and encourage talent encumbered his 
 breakfast-table; offers of advantageous pur- 
 chases and investments of capital annoyed 
 him ; and petitions and billet-doux were so 
 numerous that he committed the former to his 
 valet and the latter to the flames; horse- 
 dealers were daily bringing beauties as they 
 called them to his door, and tradesmen were 
 vying with each other to get him on their 
 books. 
 
 Mr. Stultus, who is no stultus in his trade, 
 used to send home two articles for one ; and 
 other operators for the body positively could 
 not deliver their accounts, but wished them to 
 stand over, or, rather to run on, for stand 
 they do not, the lengthy page swells with 
 time, and is turned over until it turns longer,
 
 1^0 THE TURF. 
 
 et vires acquirit eundo. So much for running 
 accounts. 
 
 We cannot, however, praise Lord Dori- 
 mont for his total neglect of applications : it 
 is the common practice of our great people ; 
 trouble is insupportable to them, and to avoid 
 it they turn their back upon the poor, and 
 only contribute to a people's wants when 
 ostentation dictates the sacrifice. Thus they 
 lose many opportunities of doing good, and 
 this would have been our hero's case, had it 
 not been for the kind interference of the 
 Countess, who was to him what Josephine was 
 to Napoleon, the reward of his exertions, the 
 adviser of good, a conciliator of Fortune's 
 frowns ; in a word, the drop of sweetness in 
 his cup. ^ 
 
 " O woman, lovely woman I Nature formed thee first 
 To temper man ; we had been brutes without ye.*' 
 
 With which deserved tribute to the sex we
 
 THE TURF. 12l 
 
 will close this chapter. To-morrow is Tues- 
 day, and a settling day at TattersalFs. Long 
 accounts and long faces may be expected after 
 the last race.
 
 122 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 " The herded Ilians rush like driven deer." 
 
 The birds of prey which infest the metro- 
 polis, feed on human flesh, and flock round 
 the gentler breed to pluck and pigeon them, 
 have acquired so many names that one is apt 
 to wish for a fresh one to distinguish their 
 black dye. Crows, hawks, vultures, legs, 
 Greeks and Trojans, have all marked their 
 denomination; we therefore here call them
 
 THE TURF. 123 
 
 Ilians for change-sake, black-legs perhaps 
 yet being the most expressive name, as dis- 
 tinguishing them from other animals, and 
 seeming to imply that a cloven-foot may be 
 concealed, or terminate the conformation of 
 a leg. We mean by this description to sig- 
 nalize those conspirators who carry the day 
 by bribery and corruption, and who would 
 employ the trigger or the bowl, had they 
 not the fear of the law before them. Of 
 this cast there were many on this Tuesday at 
 Tattersall's. 
 
 A man well versed in the transactions of 
 the turf might almost tell every man's ac- 
 count by his countenance on settling-day, 
 although the parties have quite duplicity 
 enough to endeavour to conceal it ; the lucky 
 winner, honestly or dishonestly, often affects a 
 carelessness about the coin, and the more so 
 if he be concerned in a robbery ; whilst the 
 nettled loser, whether duped, outwitted, or
 
 124 THE TURF. 
 
 over-reached by himself, assumes an easy and 
 negligent deportment, as if the sum lost could 
 be no object, or as if, playing on the square, 
 such losses were expected, and might be fol- 
 lowed by fair gains. 
 
 Nimium ne crede colori ; trust not, gentle 
 reader, such made-up faces ; watch them, and 
 they will betray themselves ; the frown dis- 
 guised, the livid lip, the elongated visage, the 
 rogue in the eye, the confusion of deport- 
 ment, heated complexion, over-acting, these 
 will point out the defeated ranks of betters. 
 The old stagers bore up pretty well ; the rawer 
 material, and those of narrow pocket, were 
 all gloom and jaundice. 
 
 Bold Pugil came forward apparently 
 calm; a long purse and acquired coolness 
 bore him up, although his losses were heavy. 
 He talked and laughed and looked about him, 
 bowing to a certain patron Marquis, and car- 
 rying the thing off pretty well. This Pugil
 
 THE TURF. 125 
 
 bears himself with tolerable decency ; he is 
 what the Scotch call discreet, t. e. liquor or 
 success will not make him split; he can be 
 trusted with a secret, and he is what some of 
 his former friends in the Daffy Club call 
 quite the gemman. In short, he has self-pos- 
 session. 
 
 But Blaze and Nightshade were very much 
 cut up. There appeared now additional de- 
 faulters, amongst whom was Brian O'Lyn ; 
 but he was fairly deceived by the report of 
 Premier's being ill. The ex-farrier looked like 
 death, and his confederates were not unlike 
 the theatrical representations of Tartarian 
 legions. 
 
 Nicholson, the valiant and trusty trainer, 
 was on the ground ; the legs could have killed 
 him with their looks ; he had on the morning 
 received a threatening letter, to tell him that 
 for his treachery his life was not safe; he 
 showed the dark epistle to his master, who
 
 126 THE TURF. 
 
 advised him to advertise a reward for the dis- 
 covery of the writer, which had the desired 
 effect. Here again the great winner stood 
 upon an eminence, so does the present race 
 bow down to the golden statue; but here 
 it was not the golden calf, as in many in- 
 stances : tact and talent, ability of mind as 
 well as weight of metal, supported the man 
 held up to notice. 
 
 The friendly Peer soon stepped forward to 
 claim his dues, and exchanged with his mutual 
 friend looks of reciprocal approval ; this Let- 
 terfield is a good body, soft but kind, a little 
 played upon, a chord vibrating to good feeling. 
 It was doubly fortunate that the late race 
 had just taken the turn which it had done, for 
 upon examining his intricate accounts, which 
 he sometimes mistook, he assured his friend 
 that his losses were excessive ; he had left a 
 great deal of cash at Hookey's, and private 
 play had consumed a great deal more. There
 
 THE TURF. 127 ^ 
 
 is no making any calculation of the latter ; a 
 man may stop and limit himself at a mo- 
 derate loss at the former, provided his pas- 
 sions do not carry him away, regret for los- 
 ing, and delusive hopes of recovery. 
 
 With cautious step the great winner still 
 bent his course, losing moderately at the 
 clubs and parties, and looking to the great 
 game on the turf, and whenever fortune 
 should come in his way in any other shape ; 
 but the most vigilant are sometimes caught 
 napping, and so was he nearly soon after. 
 
 His great gains, added to his command 
 of money, kept every eye upon him. Hookey 
 assured his friends that his Lordship was soon 
 to fall into the net, others observed that 
 the figure must come off at last ; he was so 
 fond of the turf, so bold and confident, yet 
 indifferent of his cash; at play he seemed 
 nothing and nobody: he was sure to be 
 caught before long..
 
 J28 THE TURF. 
 
 Day followed day, and scheme succeeded 
 scheme, whilst he enjoyed a round of dinners, 
 in which his fair friend participated, having 
 now got into a set very different from that 
 to which her habits and her heart had for- 
 merly attached her. Her house was now 
 completely a rendezvous for play; and she 
 felt no repugnance at what formerly would 
 have been alarming to her nature. Her beauty 
 gained her many admirers, exquisites flut- 
 tered about her; there were those amongst 
 them who fain would have detached her from 
 her choice. Proposals of a settlement were 
 formally made by one Shampetre, who swore 
 that she was divine ; and Arden pronounced 
 her quite the go. 
 ^' All would not do : her fidelity was a toute 
 
 ipreuve ! She resisted all, from Lord Nor- 
 land's insipid grin to the studied graces of 
 the handsomest dandy in town. Some said 
 that the Duke of Chatsworth sent her an
 
 THE TURF. 129 
 
 amorous letter with a splendid jewel : but this 
 was a mistake. It is thought that this mys- 
 terious present came in the form of a snake, 
 the family crest to a professional beauty ; be 
 that as it may, the letter was amiable, the pre- 
 sent elegant, and no return was sought for 
 either ; nor can we dismiss the laudable firm- 
 ness of the fair enchantress without noticing 
 her good sense and good feeling in returning 
 the proposals of a settlement to the old stager 
 (in age and experience) with the remark 
 that she had refrained from giving the letter 
 to Lord Dorimont, lest he should punish the 
 offence as it merited; and advising the bold 
 proposer not to betray friendship, or at least 
 good fellowship, in this way, nor thus to 
 transgress the laws of honour. 
 
 Amongst the splendid parties given to the 
 successful nobleman and his lady, we must 
 place that of Lord Clan Erin. This noble- 
 man is descended from an illustrious old 
 
 VOL. I. K
 
 130 THE TURF. 
 
 family, which had taken root in the Emerald 
 Isle. He has not much to recommend him ; 
 and the ministerial interest bestowed upon 
 him is the chief feather in his cap. His hand- 
 some wife brought with her the exertions of 
 her sire in his behalf, and as that sire's 
 dam was unknown, and of course could not 
 give blood, he was anxious that his talents 
 (splendid as they were) might turn to his 
 family's account. 
 
 But the father-in-law died too soon, and 
 the blood of the Huns could do nothing; he 
 bequeathed, however, an immortal name to 
 his progeny, procured post obit honours for 
 a wife, and excited noble feelings in his son- 
 in-law, amongst which some count his zeal for 
 the independence of the Gi'eeks, 
 
 Sir Charles Hazard, so called from having 
 lost much in early days to the rooks, con- 
 trived, as many do, to live on the remem- 
 brances of his former fortune. People ask
 
 THE TURF. 131 
 
 a man who has been plundered at play to 
 their tables, because, it is presumable that 
 he has seen something of the world, having 
 paid for peeping; and because it is likely 
 enough that he may be a good fellow; and 
 then agahi he may have rubbed sleeves with 
 noble Greeks and pigeons, some of whom 
 (very few) pity him, and some like him : 
 plucked pigeons are not an uncommon side- 
 dish at noblemen's tables ; and then wnert; 
 play is given they swell the numbers and look 
 well; they also learn discretion, and do better 
 than Johnny Raws. 
 
 Unless they play deep, a man giving a 
 dinner for the purpose of play, finds it diffi- 
 cult to collect a party ; although plate, china, 
 and glass may. His lordship did not find it 
 so ; the company present were the very elite 
 of quality and fashion, st£?rs, beaux and belles 
 of the first brilliancy ; the dinner was magni- 
 ficent, the variety of wines au possible, the 
 k2
 
 132 THE TURF. 
 
 attentions to the fair assiduous and refined. 
 The Countess was delighted with the party, 
 and so was Mr. Guy, the reigning sovereign 
 of the feast.
 
 THE TURF. 133 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 All 's well that ends well. 
 
 Che va piano, va sano e lontano. 
 
 OLD PROVERBS. 
 
 Tranquillity and steadiness, secresy and 
 moderation after a battle gained, are as ne- 
 cessary as coolness and preparation before it. 
 These were by no means wanting to our hero, 
 but he had another enemy to guard against. 
 As the sequel will prove, he was more of a 
 Wellington than a Buonaparte in this parti- 
 cular circumstance ; and, like the former at
 
 134 THE TURF. 
 
 Waterloo, had nearly been defeated before 
 he struck the final blow. To be taken un- 
 awares is the fate of many a consummate 
 commander. The ball at Brussels was a 
 bad prologue to the great action that followed 
 it : fate wavered for a considerable time before 
 Bulow and his army turned the scale ; and 
 the great commander was in peril when phy- 
 sical force fought him out of it, and a reserve 
 enabled him to drive the foe from the field, 
 and to follow up his success. 
 
 In like manner hours of relaxation, a pe- 
 rilous dinner, and the effect of surprise, 
 had very nearly wrested the laurels from 
 our victor's brow; but the strength of a 
 manly mind, recovered reason, observation, 
 and strength of purse — above all, firmness 
 and courage, as necessary at the gaming- 
 table as in the field of fight — turned the for- 
 tune of a night, and regained that ground 
 which imprudence had abandoned.
 
 THE TURF, 135 
 
 Confidence betrays lis into many errors, 
 but that was not the cause of the dangerous 
 dilemma in which our hero was placed after 
 the race, which became the exclusive topic of 
 racing men. A long residence on the conti- 
 nent, being early in the world, mingling in a 
 manner widi every body worth knowing abroad 
 and at home, added to his being fond of the 
 pleasures of the table, and being in himself full 
 of anecdote and a good bottle - companion, 
 would have made his society very desirable, had 
 he not possessed the talents of gold which he 
 had at his command ; so that he had a dozen 
 invitations for one which he could accept. His 
 qualifications to please, and his riches, made 
 him a great object to a certain set, and he 
 had of late indulged, very much to the annoy- 
 ance of the Countess, in what is called man- 
 dinners ; he had also gone repeatedly to Gold- 
 finch Hall, and joined in the general opinion 
 that Ude the chefde cuisine was the first in his 
 art.
 
 136 THE TURF. 
 
 Here he met with a certain Marquis, of 
 high renown as a capitalist and a hellenist ; 
 they drank together, they met again in St. 
 James's Street, they rode down the Park 
 side by side, and agreed to dine together with 
 a party of veterans, grown, like his lordship, 
 grey in the service of Bacchus and Venus, 
 and of the black spirits which preside over 
 the chances of play. There were neither 
 cards nor dice after dinner, it was not rouge 
 et noir, but rouge et blanc, Roys champaigne 
 and cool moselle, sparkling burgundy and 
 choice sauterne, the banquet of Lafitte and 
 the sweet flavour of constantia, together with 
 liqueurs, and every possible stimulus which 
 to the appetite would give a taste for added 
 libations. 
 
 At a late and heated hour, a proposal 
 came from a corner of the table, to adjourn 
 to Hookey 's hell; the word was passed, and it 
 was agreed upon to make the finish there.
 
 THE TURF. 137 
 
 His lordship arrives with a few of the party ; 
 he finds a paucity of punters at French ha- 
 zard ; he commences play with a kind of con- 
 temptuous nonchalance, as if Fortune had made 
 him her enfant gate; his success forsakes him, 
 and with it his usual caution. His good genius 
 seems to have forsaken him, and he loses a 
 considerable proportion of his winnings ; he 
 calls for new supplies, and is instantly accom- 
 modated by Hookey, between whom and a 
 veteran Marquis, suspected of having a heavy 
 stake in the house, a smile of intelligence passes, 
 as much as to say, " Give him what he wants; 
 the more the better, it will all melt in our 
 crucible, and be converted to our use." Mo- 
 ney pours in, but Fortune's wheel takes an- 
 other turn, and the favourite of the turf 
 becomes the master of the table. He breaks 
 the bank, which is again replenished ; his 
 success continues, and he gains considerably; 
 the Marquis backs him out to any amount
 
 138 THE TURF. 
 
 that he will take, and loses largely and con- 
 tinuously. His features now display lines of 
 desperation little short of those engraven on 
 the panic-struck Ilians, after the failure of 
 their manoeuvres and their total discomfiture 
 at Epsom. Infuriated with his losses, the old 
 Trojan challenges the winner to single com- 
 bat, and proposes piquet; the offer is readily 
 accepted, Lord Dorimont having so great an 
 advantage from his gains, and trusting to the 
 lessons of his tutor, a certain Italian Count : 
 the Marquis proposes large stakes, which his 
 adversary declines, determined, as an able 
 general^ to ascertain the strength of his anta- 
 gonist, and will, therefore, play for one hun- 
 dred on each game. 
 
 This resolution counteracts the designs of 
 the great man, and seems to confirm Lord 
 Dorimont in the opinion that the reports 
 afloat respecting the most noble were well 
 founded. This intelligence he had gathered
 
 THE TURF. 139 
 
 from mercenary legs, who had become birds 
 of passage on the continent when the game 
 was up at home. The veteran proved to be 
 a tactician, but one of the old school; his 
 rystem was growing obsolete, his movements 
 slow, and like Pyrrhus's elephants, when dis- 
 comfited, turned upon himself. 
 
 It was thus with the assailing party; so 
 that, after playing for some hours. Lord 
 Dorimont was the winner of many thousands, 
 and growing every hour soberer, more cau- 
 tious, and more successful. The veteran peer 
 now makes the cards, and knowing the care 
 and dexterity with which he had placed them, 
 and supposing that the attention of Lord 
 Dorimont was occupied by his snuff-box, 
 which the Jateness of the hour, fatigue, and 
 habit render necessary to him at this mo- 
 ment, proposes playing a game for ten thou- 
 sand pounds. 
 
 Lord Dorimont, who had watched and
 
 140 THE TURF. 
 
 detected the trick, hesitates for a moment, in 
 order to make his combatant more anxious 
 and confident; the proposal is pressed, and 
 at length accepted by the fortunate player ; 
 who, in his turn, cuts the cards, so as to 
 counteract the former manoeuvre, and to 
 turn it against him: Lord Dorimont now 
 deals and wins the game. The Marquis, still 
 trusting to his skill and dexterity, and ima- 
 gining that chance may have hit him in a 
 single instance, proposes three final games, 
 for ten thousand each, all of which are won 
 as before. The veteran is in despair, but dis- 
 sembles, and demands another chance; the 
 victor declines playing any more, and takes 
 leave of his worthy friend, winning from him 
 fifty thousand pounds, and overturning the 
 knowledge and practice of many years. 
 
 This ought to be a severe lesson to old 
 crows. It is at the gaming table as at war, 
 OH the turf as on the tented field; by dint of
 
 THE TURF. 141 
 
 beating our enemies, they learn our game. 
 If after means are given of taking the field 
 again, the old manoeuvres avail not; new 
 ones succeed to them, and not only succeed 
 in rotation, but in successful operation; a 
 masterly retreat very often leads to a bolder 
 advance, and to a more vigorous renewed 
 attack, when strength is reinforced, and obser- 
 vation made, to which study and practice will 
 give perfection. Such was the case with Lord 
 Dorimont; he made a prudent and well-timed 
 retreat ere his forces were entirely defeated ; 
 his reserve insured his safety as well as his 
 respectability ; he had got over in his absence 
 the fevered feelings of extreme youth, and 
 with matured judgment and a powerful ma- 
 teriel, he was enabled to cope with the most 
 formidable of his former adversaries. 
 
 These last two coups^ which were indeed 
 the coups de maitre, and to one party a coup 
 de grace, v/ere strong proofs of what we have
 
 142 THE TURF. 
 
 asserted, and indeed the modern tacticians 
 are as superior to the ancients as sunshine is 
 to the old lamps of the metropolis, calculated 
 more to mislead than to enlighten. 
 
 Lord Dorimont retired from his second 
 field of successful fight with the dignified 
 composure of one who was above being over 
 elate, and who likewise projected farther 
 operations on the turf and on the table, which 
 should raise him to a princely fortune ; and 
 what threw a sort of gravity over his reflec- 
 tions was the great escape which he had had, 
 and the necessity of keeping a greater guard 
 over himself; never to sacrifice too copiously 
 to Bacchus, lest whilst Bacchi plenus, play 
 should be proposed (a thing irresistible to 
 play-men), and caution should be wanting to 
 conduct the movements of one who has to en- 
 counter either an expert player, or to cope 
 with the chances which are in favour of a 
 banker, more particularly that limitation of
 
 THE TURF. 143 
 
 play which prevents the capitalists from re- 
 covering their losses. 
 
 On waking the next morning our hero was 
 in great spirits : no wonder — seventy thousand 
 pounds, realized in a few days, by a race and 
 a night's play ! — but (as in the instance of the 
 race) what was spirits to him was death to the 
 others ; many had been ruined by the former. 
 The loss of fifty thousand had by no means 
 that effect on the veteran : he had still great 
 riches ; but then his money was his idol ; his 
 avarice was more than commensurate with his 
 riches; he thirsted for more; his ambition 
 was also disappointed, and his pride wounded 
 by the fatal failure. 
 
 Maddened by his losses the Marquis flew to 
 his lady, not a hundred miles from Oxford, 
 and rushed into her presence more like a de- 
 mon than a lover. She trembled, and inquired 
 the cause of his great agitation ; he informed 
 her ; slie tried to sooth him ; nothing will do ;
 
 144 THE TURF. 
 
 he cast himself furiously on the sofa, groaned, 
 talked incoherently, called for glass after glass 
 of cura^oa, until he was conveyed to bed in a 
 raging fever. This added to a gross habit of 
 body brought on a severe fit of the gout, in the 
 paroxysms of which he was delirious, and raved 
 about divers misdeeds too tedious to mention. 
 Amongst others he talked of fellow-prisoners 
 whom he cheated of their last shilling, and 
 of other victims who have been ruined by his 
 arts. 
 
 This state of excitement was too violent to 
 endure, and in one short month he breathed 
 his last, unknown and unregretted, leaving his 
 immense fortune and winnings to a spurious 
 race; another useful lesson to gamblers, 
 though we fear they will not profit by it. 
 
 The Countess waited until dark the next 
 day, ere her Chevalier made his appearance 
 at her house. She was lonely and triste, 
 pensive and unhappy : she rose not as usual
 
 THE TURF. 145 
 
 to meet him on his entering the room, and he 
 perceived that she had been shedding tears. 
 Extending his hand towards her, he informed 
 her of the cause of his delay, the late hour at 
 which he had retired to rest, and the immense 
 sum which he had won ; she struggled at a smile, 
 as the pearly drops fell from her eye-lid, saying 
 in a dulcet tone, " Well ! if it is so much for 
 your benefit I must not repine, nor complain 
 of the pains of absence, nor those of doubt.'* 
 On the last words she laid stronger emphasis, 
 which drew no remark, no added demonstra- 
 tion of tenderness from him : the fact was 
 that he was falling off in his affectionate 
 assiduities ; his love was cooling ; his rage for 
 winning money, the golden dream of ambi- 
 tion, had eclipsed a tenderer flame. True 
 love admits no rival passion in the heart : it 
 burns alone ; no gains, no title, no ulterior 
 object can divert it from its station ; no plea- 
 sure can supply the place of the presence of 
 
 VOL. I. L
 
 146 THE TURF. 
 
 the beloved, no pastime^ beguile the hours of 
 absence, or cheat the hour of appointment of 
 one moment. 
 
 This, keenly felt by the sex in general, was 
 so felt by this fair sufferer ; but man varies 
 like the weather, and when love grows cool 
 flies to some other passion, which at last sup- 
 plants it altogether. The sportsman's and the 
 gamester's favourite must not expect exclusive 
 devotion nor romantic passion ; a fox-chase 
 or a race are more captivating to a man of the 
 turf than beauty's banner, or a t4te-a-t^te with 
 a woman of angel form ; the gamester would 
 sacrifice bosom-friend, sweetheart, wife, chil- 
 dren, king and country to a deal or a throw, 
 to a night's speculation or an odd game. 
 
 What chance has woman's charms of se- 
 curing him whose mind is occupied in calcu- 
 lating the chances of a game ? What hold has 
 she on him who is spell- bound, when a few 
 throws of the dice decide the fate of his for-
 
 Kb 
 
 THE TURF. 147 
 
 tune, whether to be doubled or transferred to 
 the pocket of a stranger? Very little indeed. 
 Let the dear creatures look to it, and let no 
 such man be trusted. 
 
 The Countess was one of those few women 
 who are sensible enough to know that com- 
 ph'ment never returns love; and she was 
 the only one of her nation with whom we 
 have been acquainted, who was above the 
 little art of bouderie to keep up an artifi- 
 cial game of jealousy or of interest. Gentle 
 silence, and a colder smile, which she ap- 
 peared to conceal, were all that proved 
 the discovery that other pursuits estranged 
 him daily more and more from her ; jealousy 
 had no part in her feeling, because she had no 
 rival; but dejection and regret powerfully 
 assailed lier bosom, excited by the estrange- 
 ment which had lately taken place. 
 
 A turn in the Park was proposed, but it 
 was too dark and too late ; a shopping excur- 
 l2
 
 THE TURF, 
 
 sion was then named by his Lordship, who 
 calculated that an opportune present would 
 dispel the passing cloud, and therefore hinted 
 that he wanted a few articles of jewellery as a 
 lure, intending to purchase some for Victo- 
 rine. This would have succeeded with nine- 
 tenths of women situated as she was; with 
 her it was of no value, '* Mon cher Dori- 
 mont^^ replied she to this observation, " vas 
 si tu veux ; pour moi, je rCai besoin de rien 
 dans le monde" 
 
 This " nothing in the world" was conclu- 
 sive ; it spoke volumes ; it showed that crowns 
 and sceptres, riches and titles weighed no- 
 thing in her scale, which was intended to 
 counterpoise genuine and unaltered love. 
 
 Lord Dorimont wanted not penetration; 
 he felt the force of the reply, but was neither 
 inclined nor prepared to meet it fairly: he 
 therefore evaded it by saying, " Well, love, 
 and where do we dine ? " 
 
 " I have sent three apologies motived in
 
 THE TURF. 149 
 
 indisposition, but you can accept which you 
 like, or dine at the Club ; for it would be too 
 triste for you to dine tete-a-tete with me." 
 
 Although he was growing indifferent to 
 those enchantments which first won him, 
 honour called upon him to make an effort at 
 something gallant. 
 
 " Parhleu ! '* exclaimed he, " Victorine, I 
 shall be quite delighted ; the very thing that 
 would suit me ; by Jove you could not pro- 
 pose a better thing ! A tete-a-tete to be sure ; 
 who would not enjoy such a t^te-a-tetel^* 
 
 She put her hand upon his mouth; he 
 resumed, " Well, so we will, and we will look 
 in at the Opera for an hour. You have not 
 lent your box, I hope, Victorine ? " 
 
 « No." 
 
 The business was settled ; and after going 
 home to dress, he returned to a late dinner, 
 and tried to make himself as agreeable as 
 possible, entertaining Victorine however with
 
 150 T^E TURF. 
 
 the darling object of his pursuit, namely, 
 play transactions, and his anticipations of 
 future success on the turf. At the same time 
 he wished her to issue cards for a soiree; 
 a sort of ambigu, where a concert and danc- 
 ing might introduce private play. 
 
 These ambigus, like ladies of gallantry, are 
 dangerous things ; they are like meeting an 
 enemy under neutral colours. Music softens 
 the mind and lets loose the passions ; beauty 
 bewilders wisdom, and puts all calculation at 
 defiance; a lovely one in the mazes of the 
 dance intoxicates the brain more than mant- 
 ling champagne. Who that has just held 
 in his arms an animated statue transcending 
 the finest Grecian model, and gliding round 
 with such a treasure in full view before him, 
 is fit for watching the turn up of a card, or 
 attending to the chances of ecarte, piquet, or 
 hazard. The things are irreconcileable ; they 
 however tell well for the houses where such a
 
 THE TURF. 151 
 
 variety of amusements is announced, and well 
 conducted. 
 
 The Countess consented to this proposition, 
 being, as we have already said, no enemy to 
 play, nor to the assemblage of company which 
 it produces. Play is for the most part 
 the resource of idleness, or of a vacant 
 mind: it afterwards becomes habitual, and 
 it is well if it go no farther : more ordi- 
 narily it grows into a passion, and leads to 
 avarice or a love of gain, which are almost 
 sjrnonymous, the one being the poco meno^ 
 and the other the poco piu. 
 
 There was, however, another motive for 
 fair Victorine*s relishing the pastime of the 
 card-table; it took her from herself. She 
 could have passed her days in retirement, and 
 in sequestered shades with the man of her 
 heart, but that could not be ; distraction and 
 dissipation were therefore necessary remedies 
 to a mind diseased. 
 
 There was a time when the Chevalier
 
 152 THE TURF. 
 
 would have left every other pursuit for one 
 hour of Victorine's society; there was now, 
 alas ! the greatest charm wanting to it, novelty, 
 and nothing to hope; so that although she 
 looked everything the heart of man could 
 wish for, the time flew not on wings as here- 
 tofore, and the announcement of coffee, and 
 the arrival of the carriage to take them to the 
 Opera proved a relief. 
 
 There are minds cast in such a mould that 
 mystery and dangers, difficulty and uncer- 
 tainty, rivalry and vanity, are absolutely ne- 
 cessary to keep alive a flame unkindled by 
 ambition, and fed only by caprice. Our 
 hero's mind was of this cast, and it was also 
 of that strength and consistency that in- 
 trigue sufficed not to it ; it must rest upon 
 something more stern than the soft allure- 
 ments of love ; woman's power was not abso- 
 lute with him; fortune and fame were the 
 idols of his devotion : in a word, Victorine 
 and he were ill assorted. As vanity was not
 
 THE TURF. 153 
 
 entirely absent from his mind, the admiration 
 which his fair one attracted at the Opera, so 
 far from annoying him had the contrary 
 effect, and he was quite gratified at seeing so 
 many butterflies fluttering about his mistress. 
 Although she had begun to speak English 
 pretty well, yet was she nevertheless deficient 
 in understanding many things; nor could 
 she comprehend the merits of pigeon-shoot- 
 ing, steeple-hunting, nor gentleman-jockies. 
 Captain Harlequin was not introduced to her 
 as such, and she was informed that he was a 
 great favourite with the fair sex; that he com- 
 menced on the turf under a bad reputation : 
 something had been said about altering or mak- 
 ing out pedigrees for horses, mis-statements 
 of ages, and other little turf-peccadilloes ; but 
 that passed off* with time; bold riding, and 
 the backing his friend Pigeoneau at shooting 
 poor little doves, let out, like other doves for 
 the sport of man, had brought him into no-
 
 154 THE TURF. 
 
 toriety, as had the pigeon-shooting of his 
 trusty ally. The Countess thought it odd that 
 one man gained fortune and fame by being a 
 long shot, and another for drawing a long 
 bow; that crossing a country with nothing in 
 view but to break a brother rider's neck, or 
 to pick his pocket, should establish the fame 
 of another ; and that it was more ambitioned 
 to be a member of the Yacht Club or four- 
 in-hand, than to shine as the representative 
 of a nation in Parliament; nay, that money 
 should promote all pursuits, not forgetting 
 the last, where venality is not more uncom- 
 mon than on the race course, in the tennis- 
 court, or in the hells. 
 
 A word en passant in regard to Pigeoneau. 
 He is a man of good appearance, of far north- 
 country breed and fair character ; he had a 
 castle, and it is not one of the castles in the 
 air ; but what are these in comparison to the 
 trigger? To this we would advise him to 
 confine himself, unless he has better informa-
 
 THE TURF. 155 
 
 tion on the race than on the last, and better 
 luck than on his steeple-chase; pigeons may 
 be shot in more than one way : the gun is the 
 most certain and honourable, and let him 
 stick to it. 
 
 Here we must not omit a Melton-man, ac- 
 quainted of course with Pigeoneau, and like 
 him paying his devoirs to the French Coun- 
 tess. Captain Bipatri, a gay blade, whose 
 greatest pride seems to be to establish his 
 bastardy, and to renounce one father who 
 owned him, for some more illustrious name ; to 
 wish to publish the frailty of a mother; to 
 drag into publicity the shame of her whose 
 name it would be a virtue to defend, whose 
 fault it would be a duty to hide. 
 
 The Captain's expenses are great; his 
 establishments at Melton are on the first scale; 
 debts pretty extensive ; but must push ; money 
 being the price by which emancipation from 
 pecuniary difficulties must be purchased ? 
 The age is really corrupt when we see ways
 
 156 THE TURF. . 
 
 and means resorted to by men of fashion ; we 
 say fashion, for here is one who appears 
 unblushingly determined on tarnishing his 
 family. Poor old General, thou hadst a 
 hopeful son if he be thine ; if not, it is a great 
 pity that he should not have the same honour- 
 able feeling, as to keeping a secret, as thyself. 
 The transaction at Hookey's now occupied 
 the place of the desperate race ; congratula- 
 tions were numerous on the occasion ; but 
 the winner began to be as much feared as he 
 was courted ! The legs began to be very much 
 puzzled about him ; his capital invited them 
 to plunder: but it also gave him means of 
 resistance by combination destructive to the 
 minor men. There is such a thing as doing 
 by others what cannot be done by self. His 
 success induced others to consider him as the 
 Enfant gate de la Victoire ; lastly, some sus- 
 pected that he could play the whole game, 
 and that his knowledge surpassed their
 
 THE TURF. 157 
 
 own; or was it a momentary wonder, like 
 the great Captain of the age, the conqueror 
 overthrown by his own ambition? To use 
 their own phrase, they did not know what to 
 make of him. 
 
 The secret intelligence which overthrew 
 the two parties of the fraternity at Epsom was 
 a hideous phantom in their sight; night and 
 day they set in dark divan to consult on the 
 best method of assailing him. Some thought 
 that he would enter into a plan for a share of 
 plunder ; but his rank, high bearing, former 
 character and distance, finally discouraged the 
 idea. Wine seemed the most probable ally, 
 but all was doubt and dismay.
 
 158 THE TURF. 
 
 ^ 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 Quid Don mortalia pectora cogis. 
 
 Auri sacra fames ? '* 
 
 " How sleep the brave?" That we will 
 not answer ; but how sleeps the unsuccessful 
 Greek ? Unknown and unmourned his wealtli 
 goes to the spendthrift, his riches are scat- 
 tered abroad, his name consigned to con- 
 tempt: success has quite another effect; it 
 can even consecrate a crime, and he who pos- 
 sesses it must know how to use it with mode- 
 ration, and how to build upon it.
 
 THE TURF. 159 
 
 The veteran Marquis, like Ajax, died by his 
 own hand ; for although he had not the cou- 
 rage to plunge the steel into his breast, despair 
 and madness drove him to that excessive 
 drinking which consumed him ; he was lite- 
 rally burned out, leaving mountains of wealth 
 behind him, on which alone his heart had 
 rested, and which he counted on enjoying for 
 a long series of years. 
 
 His had been a stirring and eventful pas- 
 sage. How much Fortune had done for 
 him ! yet, not content with her favours, he 
 must resort to every thing base to increase 
 an already ample fortune; a mercenary mar- 
 riage, love of play, descending to all the 
 arts of the Greeks of old, selfish, by turns 
 stingy and lavish in expense, covetous of 
 others' store, and not nice as to the com- 
 pany he kept, or the considerations requisite 
 to obtain it; in short he was nulla virtute 
 redemptus.
 
 160 THE TURF. 
 
 Lord Dorimont's play transactions were 
 now fewer, and rather on the losing side; but 
 these were mere pastimes, a forfeit that must 
 be paid to society, and had no effect on his 
 growing income ; for his estates were increas- 
 ing as well as his luck, and he was incessantly 
 forming plans of ambition, in all of which 
 he ultimately succeeded. In success, he was 
 J^P^TJ determined to take care of himself in every 
 acceptation of the word ; in health, in fortune, 
 in his amusements on the turf, and in promot- 
 ing a perfect tranquillity of mind. He was as 
 fond as ever of the Turf, but resolved to 
 sacrifice less to it and to play, but he would i 
 lay by for another great hit, and now the 
 grand racing campaign was at hand, and the 
 season short. 
 
 The fame of Premier having spread itself 
 widely abroad, and the last scheme of atrocity 
 for either compassing his life or making him 1 
 
 .a.* ^^'
 
 THE TURF. 161 
 
 lose having failed, a number of backers were 
 found for the next coming race, at which he 
 started with two others of our hero's horses. 
 Monimia and Sir Jerry were become fa- 
 vourites; the trainer kept all right, but his 
 master was resolved not to play so deep a 
 game as before ; the same thing was not likely 
 to happen again, so that he became a cautious 
 better, keeping his book with great judg- 
 ment, and making himself safe at all points ; 
 his friend Lord Letterfield still stuck to him, 
 and they sported, for themselves and fair fa- 
 vourites, the best turn-outs upon the ground. 
 
 The departure for Newmarket was fixed : 
 Dorimont was to set out first, and to be fol- 
 lowed by the Countess the day after. On the 
 day previous to his departure, he called to 
 say a few words of short adieu, when he found 
 la belle Victorine extremely pensive. 
 
 " I have heard from Paris to-day," said 
 she ; " the Count is very ill." 
 
 VOL. I. M
 
 162 THE TURF. 
 
 " Is he," replied Lord Dorimont with the 
 utmost indifference. 
 
 " Very dangerously so," resumed the lady. 
 " Heigh ho ! perhaps he may now be no 
 more." 
 
 " You will then have to go into mourn- 
 ing, Victorine." 
 
 " Perhaps I may have cause to mourn 
 before that takes place." 
 
 " Ay, ay?" 
 
 "You do not understand me:" here she 
 wept. 
 
 " Don't spoil your pretty eyes, Victorine ; 
 I am sure he is not worth weeping for." 
 
 " Dorimont, I do but weep for myself;" 
 said she in an impassioned tone. 
 
 " Oh fie ! there is no need for that." 
 
 This was too much for her, and she started 
 up, uttering in a subdued tone, " Your love 
 for me is changed." 
 
 ^^Pas de tout" said he; "but I have a
 
 THE TURF. 163 
 
 number of things to think of. I have heavy 
 concerns ; I am going to lay out near forty 
 thousand pounds in improving my estates; 
 and I have more money on the next race 
 than I thought I had. I do not choose to sell 
 out of the funds, as I think there may be a 
 momentary rise, and I was just thinking how 
 I stood with my bankers: but, good bye, one 
 embrace before you leave me." 
 
 " Non, Milord, vous etes un ingrat ! " 
 with which she flew into her boudoir, and 
 locked the door. 
 
 This was the first shadow of a quarrel which 
 ever took place between them. The suavity 
 of her manner and the gentleness of her tem- 
 per made such a thing almost impossible; 
 moreover his will was hers. In this she differed 
 materially from her countrywomen in gene- 
 ral : but here her pride was wounded; she saw 
 herself slighted; the mask of fondness had 
 fallen off, and had left the cold features of in- 
 M 2
 
 164 THE TURF. 
 
 difference in its stead. With the delusion 
 her happiness had flown for ever. 
 
 A warmer disposition than Lord Dorimont's 
 would have been melted by the scene : woman's 
 tears are mighty organs on the heart, but our 
 hero had an invariable rule, which was, 
 not to give way to female domination; his 
 pride and his cunning made him persevere in 
 this : no female interference or favoritism 
 would have guided him, had he an empire or 
 an army to command ; he therefore calmly 
 cleared his voice, and saying, « Adieu done, 
 Vietorine," to a closed door, he descended 
 the staircase, mounted his thoroughbred 
 horse, and cantered off to Stevens's, where he 
 dined with a man-party. 
 
 Just as the cloth was removed a billet was 
 delivered to him; it was in a sweet little hand- 
 writing, scented and on rose-coloured paper; 
 a speaking-seal, representing ivy torn from a 
 tree, with the device, " Jemoeur ou je m'at-
 
 THE TURF. 165 
 
 tache" and the impression of a tear on the 
 superscription, which was " Pour Dorimont^'' 
 Such were ils characteristics. 
 
 " Pray read it, Dorimont,"said Lord Malm- 
 sey ; " some new conquest, I suppose ? " 
 
 « No, faith, it is the old story over again;" 
 with which he put it in his pocket. 
 
 " It requires an answer," whispered Eau 
 de Luce, his French valet de chambre ; " the 
 Countess is very ill." 
 
 " Oh ! tell the Countess I will be with her 
 at eleven o'clock." 
 
 These words were accompanied by a dry 
 look, which meant "she is growing trouble- 
 some; these are woman's stale tricks;" then 
 turning to Loi-d Malmsey and to his ci-devant 
 Cicerone (for now he wanted none), " I beg 
 your pardon, I think a glass of Moselle would 
 do us no harm." 
 
 The young man could not help saying, " I 
 do not think you want a cooler ; " for he had
 
 166 THE TURF. 
 
 seen and admired the Countess, and wondered 
 at this sudden change. 
 
 The hour of eleven struck; Lord Dori- 
 mont's carriage was announced, but he stuck 
 to the claret ; the young man good-naturedly 
 gave him a hint, which taking, he arose, and 
 repaired to his fair one's abode. 
 
 Whether madam had taken to her couch, 
 or was reclining in all the attractive beauties of 
 grief on her sofa, matters little to the reader; 
 or whether she was drawing soft notes from the 
 harp ; or, with hand reclined on marble table, 
 less white and polished than her arm, listen- 
 ing to the^olian chords vibrating romance to 
 the winds ; this is little essential to the work : 
 suffice it to say that real agony inhabited her 
 mind, whilst studied fair words flowed from 
 her lips. 
 
 She had sent for him to excuse herself fol- 
 lowing him to the race, which resolution he 
 prevailed upon her to change; it was not
 
 THE TURF. 16T 
 
 what she said to him on this occasion which 
 was important to either of them, but what 
 was left unsaid. 
 
 The clock struck two before they parted ; 
 he pressed her to his heart, but there was no- 
 thing in that. She retired to her chamber in 
 despair ; the gulph was now before her which 
 the roses of true-love had hidden from her 
 sight ; there was likewise no retreat. Expo- 
 sure had gone abroad ; home was shut upon 
 her; she scarcely knew herself. What, she — 
 the idol of her circle, the object of his idolatry ? 
 — no ! she was now to all intents and purposes 
 nothing but his mistress, and supported by 
 him, though she had not permitted her imagi- 
 nation to dwell on the idea. If her husband 
 were to die to-morrow, what had she to expect? 
 the conversation of the morning spoke for 
 itself. 
 
 Lord Dorimont left Victorine with an air 
 of sorrow ; but in looking back at her win-
 
 168 ' THE TURF. 
 
 dow he shook his head ; it was completely, 
 " Adieu, mal maison ! " 
 
 And now let us examine the letter from 
 Paris, and the morning scene. 
 
 She had heard from a friend in Paris, who 
 stated that the worthless old Comit was de- 
 clining fast, but that he was neither ill nor in 
 danger, much less on the point of death ; the 
 idea had just struck her of trying her lover's 
 constancy; the attempt was fatal: this was 
 the first artifice to which she had resorted, and 
 it turned against herself. How often had her 
 lover sworn that he envied no man on earth 
 but him who could call himself the_ husband 
 of such a wife; but this language was held 
 whilst he was an expectant, '^hrisons Id," as 
 the French say. 
 
 Our hero wanted not a good heart; he had 
 entered life as ardently as other young men, 
 but he had been played upon ; practised de- 
 ceit under the specious semblance of friend-
 
 THE TURF. ' 169 
 
 ship had chilled the genial current of his soul. 
 Gifted with great observation, he had now lived 
 too long and too much to value them as more 
 inexperienced, less penetrating characters do. 
 On the score of female society, his mind was 
 too strong, and his habits too hardy to give 
 him a taste for sighings and mournings and 
 winings, tender attentions and gentle con- 
 verse, endearing nothings, and the intelli- 
 gence of looks; in burning incense at the 
 skrine of beauty, living in attendance at a 
 lovely tyrant^s call, turning over the leaves 
 of a music-book, or devoting his hours of 
 idleness, or to the composing of love-sonnets. 
 The Countess's beauty might have attracted 
 any one; but pride had a large portion in our 
 hero's passion ; and the absence from higher 
 and more active pursuits — from ambition, 
 home, the turf, promoted more than any- 
 thing else his temporary devotion to this 
 lovely woman.
 
 ITO THE TURF. 
 
 He had not asked himself how long that 
 feeling would exist ; he did not at the mo- 
 ment calculate on the death of his uncle ; the 
 the happy present was all his care, nor did 
 he (cruel to think on !) consider, when he 
 summoned her to desert every tie which 
 home and family made sacred, how long his 
 attachment for the fair emigrant might pre- 
 serve its integrity. Here vanity dictated to 
 him again; her presence made him happy 
 for the moment, and was a feather in his 
 cap. 
 
 It is a proud thing for a man who has 
 a mysterious love affair, to behold a splen- 
 did woman, followed, admired, sought, and 
 to say to himself in secret, qual cor e'7 mio. 
 There certainly is not a more thrilling sensa- 
 tion in life : but its duration was not perma- 
 nent; honour imperiously called upon him to 
 respect appearances with the world, and to 
 make a suitable settlement on the lady ; the
 
 THE TURF. 171 
 
 first he adhered to, yet the secret was soon 
 out ; the second, her noble independent spirit 
 prevented for a considerable time — he at- 
 tached no price to it, and it purchased not 
 happiness for her. 
 
 His love had cooled, but his heart still 
 told him that much feeling was due to her 
 who had sacrificed so much for him ; he, 
 therefore, had recourse to all those ordinary 
 means which succeed with ordinary women, 
 namely, peace-making by presents. These 
 were of little avail : he had not examined 
 thoroughly the extent of her sensibility, and 
 had not time sufficient to devote exclusively 
 to her. He accordingly left a present of 
 jewels for her, and a letter to inform her that 
 on his return to town he would purchase for 
 her a pair of ponies, the handsomest in Eng- 
 land, and on which he had his eye, knowing 
 that they would please her. He concluded 
 his letter by observing that he impatiently
 
 172 THE TURF. 
 
 expected her to follow him; and that she 
 would be the handsomest woman on the race- 
 course, which would want its greatest orna- 
 ment without her. 
 
 Flattery, thou art always welcome to fair 
 woman ! The Countess smiled on perusing 
 those last words ; but it was a cold smile. 
 
 In compliance wdth his request, and still 
 more, to fly from herself, she prepared to 
 follow him to Newmarket. Dissipation is 
 the only remedy for disappointed feeling — 
 blighted love. Variety, show, occupation for 
 hours which would otherwise be hours of suf- 
 fering, these are the only means left to ba- 
 nish intrusive care. How many victims to 
 passions of different kinds owe their tem- 
 porary relief to this resource ! — and this had 
 now completely become the fair victim's case ; 
 she affected to be the gayest of the gay, 
 lived in public, shone like a meteor at night 
 in her box at the Opera, and drove out in the
 
 THE TURF. 173 
 
 morning, or rather the afternoon, flying 
 from place to place. The busy scene of a 
 race-course, or the uncertain chances of a 
 play table, occupied her attention, and ba- 
 nished other thoughts. Her misfortunes had 
 nearly changed her mind ; which, from flow- 
 ing in gentle simplicity, and dwelling upon 
 one object, was now reduced to stratagems, 
 partly to divert it from serious reflection, and 
 partly to endeavour to regain admiration in 
 lieu of affection. 
 
 Vanity being (as she had found by sad ex- 
 perience) a huge component part in man, 
 she was driven to the necessity of making the 
 most of those charms which nature had be- 
 stowed upon her. This is a common prac- 
 tice with the fair sex ; when gentle simplicity 
 loses, or seems to have lost iis powerful at- 
 tractions, art is called in to its aid ; studied 
 graces and practised smiles, follow the un- 
 conscious ease of youth, the laughing eye and
 
 It4t THE TURF. 
 
 dimpled cheek of early attractiveness; the 
 study of what is becoming occupies much 
 time and attention; striking effects, costly 
 ornaments, fashionable appearance, all come 
 into play ; these draw the admiring crowd of 
 flatterers, as insects are drawn by the solar 
 beam. Envy and rivalry take up their station, 
 and vanity recalls the deserting lover, who 
 seeing his mistress admired by all is anxious 
 to appear the happy favoured one. 
 
 In practising this manoeuvre, great judg- 
 ment is necessary : a little jealousy increases 
 the interest awakened; too much destroys it 
 altogether; weak men may be led by jea- 
 lousy; sensible men are above it, and pro- 
 perly conclude, where levity exists, capricious 
 change, or practised trick to triumph by 
 tormenting, no true affection can take root; 
 for true love disdains such arts, and could 
 not for a moment enjoy the victory gained by 
 inflicting pain on the object of its tender and 
 immutable regards.
 
 THE TURF. 175 
 
 The imse d^ amour (and there are as many 
 of these as there are of ruses de guerre) prac- 
 tised by the Countess was merely that of 
 drawing admiration to such a point as to 
 claim increased attention and vigilance from 
 Lord Dorimont, and to gratify him in return, 
 by showing how indifferent she was to the flat- 
 tery and assiduities of others: in this she suc- 
 ceeded to a charm. Her carriage was beset 
 with beaux, her box at the Opera was visited 
 by the greatest dandies and danglers of the 
 day, both old and young; for of the first 
 class the fading wintry remains still sun 
 themselves in beauty's smile ; still fancy that 
 youthful features and graces lurk about their 
 persons and manners : of these some are hor- 
 rible lisping old men ; and self-satisfied cox- 
 combs of mature age are detestable. 
 
 Many of this tribe followed la belle Victo- 
 rine : a fine woman, a foreigner, and one 
 about whom there wasa certain degree of
 
 176 THE TURF. 
 
 mystery. All this fed the conceit of animals 
 like these. Of this species was Lord Love- 
 more, who fancies every woman is in love 
 with him : the pleasures of imagination must 
 be very lively with him, and perhaps those of 
 hope; but if ever man existed less recom- 
 mendable to female favour than another, we 
 pronounce him to be the man. This opi- 
 nion was also entertained by the charming 
 stranger, whom we shall now leave making her 
 preparation to quit town for a week, and 
 anxious for Lord Dorimont's success at the 
 races.
 
 THE TURF. 177 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 O'Rourke's noble feast •will ne'er be forgot. 
 
 By those who were there, or those who were not." 
 
 Premier and the Derby were fresh in the 
 memory of every leg, from the top of the 
 list down to the lowest stable urchin. The 
 failure of two deep-laid schemes, the pre- 
 sence of mind of the great winner, the dis- 
 comfiture of two rival bands of the fraternity, 
 all occupied the attention of those who were 
 
 VOL. I. N
 
 nS THE TUBF. 
 
 to be actors on a similar scene, under dissi- 
 milar circumstances. The same parties were to 
 be put in motion for the races, and the same 
 honestMlows were to play off their usual game 
 of deciding what horses should be winners, not 
 from their strength and velocity, nor by the 
 superior management and masterly riding of 
 their jockies, but by the books of the legs, 
 whose command of capital is prodigious, and 
 as astounding in its amount as in the means 
 by which it was accumulated. A compa- 
 ratively short time has raised the capitalists 
 from obscurity into flourishing fortunes. 
 
 There are, as we have already observed, 
 two parties of this fraternity against fair-play, 
 on and off the turf: their end cannot be 
 accomplished without minor agents, — -jockies 
 and trainers, with whom the farrier sometimes 
 combines ; so that sickness, bad condition, 
 lameness, short wind, death and defeat are 
 certain by turns ; not to mention bad starts
 
 THE TURF. 179 
 
 and boltings, all of which can be very cle- 
 verly managed, and answer most perfectly the 
 end proposed. 
 
 With the experience of this, it is astonish- 
 ing that so many fair dealers should continue 
 to be the dupes they are ; for so overwhelm- 
 ing is the influence of bribery, that scarcely 
 a nobleman oi gentleman, however liberal 
 and generous, can depend on his jockey. 
 
 But previous to this next trip to New- 
 market, it will be well to look back to the 
 secret movers, one party of whom can com- 
 mand half a million, so that to attempt to 
 cope with them is nothing less than infatua- 
 tion on the part of fair dealers, more espe- 
 cially as the latter are not unaware of the 
 strength and tricks of the former. 
 
 The first party, as we shall call it, is sprung 
 from the dregs of society, for of the " turf^'^ 
 as it now stands, it may be said as of the 
 road —
 
 180 THE TURF. 
 
 " The rule of the road is a paradox quite. 
 If you go to the left you are sure to be right." 
 
 The right forward straight line of conduct 
 will be of no avail, but sinister schemes, where 
 the honest sportsman is left to his fate, is the 
 only road to riches. Nor is it better in the 
 ring (a very minor line of sporting) ; you may 
 beat all the ring, and when you back the 
 best man, you are as likely to lose as ever ; 
 concert and combination, bribery and cor- 
 ruption, carry all before them. 
 
 But to return to the materials of which 
 the turf-junta is composed. Who would ex- 
 pect to find ex-butchers and fistic fellows, 
 quill-drivers and broken tradesmen, little 
 clerks in public offices, and members of the 
 livery, not of London (tremble not, ye civic 
 dandies! scarlet-coated hunters, and counter 
 coxcombs, racing shopkeepers and gambling 
 bankrupts,) but of the bribery and toY-stables, 
 the controllers of the turf? — the deciders of
 
 THE TURF. 181 
 
 the winnings and losings on it ; and like the 
 Leviathan Rothschild * on the Stock Ex- 
 change, be able to come in with a mountain 
 of capital, and to influence the tide of for- 
 tune. 
 
 Thus the noble game which the turf 
 afforded, when the royal and rich of the 
 land, the aristocracy and landholders, sup- 
 ported it ; when blood in man and horse kept 
 the lead, and when valiant knight and lovely 
 lady crowded the race-course, is now beset by 
 legs and other adventurers, and rendered 
 more a scene of business than of pleasure. 
 Apropos^ we cannot help noticing that the 
 love of the lucre of gain has so crept into 
 all classes, that our young men at Tattersall's, 
 at Epsom, Newmarket, in their clubs, and 
 
 * This man of gold must not take offence ; we make 
 no comparison betwixt him and turf-hrokers as to 
 principles :— but as to principal, his we believe to be 
 honourable, theirs is guided by their interest.
 
 182 THE TURF. 
 
 when at the theatres, seem to have business 
 so in view, that what the French call V amiable 
 foible is confined to the novice only and the 
 unplucked pigeon. 
 
 But to return to the first class of the turf- 
 conductors: this heterogeneous mixture of 
 characters has contrived, in an indescribable 
 short period of time, to amass a directing and 
 imposing capital; two of the parties are 
 supposed to possess one hundred thousand 
 pounds each; at all events, we know one 
 thing, that is, that their names are good for 
 that sum, and that their bills and bets would 
 be taken to that amount. We need say no 
 more to prove to the novice on the turf, or 
 in the ring, that if fair play be a jewel, it is 
 not to be sought for at either. 
 
 The second class may be about as respect- 
 able as to birth as the first, but is inferior in 
 means ; neither does it affect all the outward 
 signs of elegance in carriages and carriage
 
 THE TURF. 183 
 
 ladies, the dainties of the table, or the re- 
 finement of the vinous fluid, which now slake 
 the thirst of upstart plebeians, who have risen 
 by Fortune's ladder (we say not how) into 
 affluence. The motley group, however, do 
 great things by violent means ; and when we 
 recollect that broken tradesmen, jockies, far- 
 riers, fighters, footmen, and hell-keepers, 
 form the firm, we need not expect that they 
 will be, (to use the vulgar phrase of one of 
 them) nice as to a shade. Hookey, of the 
 great hell, patronises and goes with the first 
 party; his splendid establishment at New- 
 market is of a piece with his town concern. 
 
 Let us~ now return to our hero and to 
 the Countess, leaving these black bands to 
 the obloquy which they merit; the last of 
 which, after having pigeoned all the gentle- 
 men who came in their way, turned to de- 
 stroying their own species, namely, other legs^ 
 and thus preying on one another.
 
 184 THE TURF. 
 
 Lord Dorimont had made all his arrange- 
 ments for the second spring meeting, had 
 consulted his book, and received the neces- 
 sary information from his trainer, who still 
 continued as faithful to him as able in his 
 manoeuvres, so that he was making progres- 
 sively a little competency with integrity and 
 fair dealing, qualities that would not suit 
 great rogues, who aim at great fortunes, and 
 who having no character to lose, no con- 
 science to consult, do not find that honesty is 
 the best policy. 
 
 Lord Dorimont had just made up his mind 
 respecting a plan to be developed hereafter ; 
 this he had nearly made certain, and from 
 the intimacy now subsisting betw^een Lord 
 Letterfield and himself, he had imparted 
 useful advice to him, by which he might 
 have won ; but the Peer's head was confused 
 with love, and being no very great calcula- 
 tor, he contrived to lose on the Turf and at
 
 THE TURF. 185 
 
 the table. Some how or other every body 
 gets a slice at him — at Hookey's, at private 
 play, on the turf, with the ladies : this is a 
 pity, - for as we have often said, he is a kindly 
 disposed soul : there is great amenity in his 
 manners, and we sincerely hope that to this 
 suaviter in modo he may add the fortiter 
 in re, a thing very desirable for his friends, 
 both male and female, to whom the material 
 of the Peer has been abundantly beneficial. 
 He has done many generous things, some 
 almost princely ones : he paid upon a cer- 
 tain occasion the debts of a friend to the 
 amount of thousands, and we hope that he 
 will not, in common with most generous men, 
 fall ultimately a victim to the ingratitude and 
 the designs of the artful. 
 
 In a conversation once on the above sub- 
 ject, the noble Lord spoke to his friend nearly 
 to the following effect, which forms a great 
 part of his Lordship's biography :
 
 186 THE TURF. 
 
 " My dear Lord Dorimont, you have been 
 at your outset in life a fellow-sufferer from 
 Greeks and false friends. As to myself, I 
 have been cruelly their dupe ; when I came 
 to my title and fortune, at the age of twenty- 
 one, I was artless, unsuspecting, wholly igno- 
 rant of the world and its deceits, and had 
 not a friend or relation to look up to for 
 advice or guidance. 
 
 "I soon became intimate with titled Greeks, 
 amongst whom was a noble Peer, well 
 known for his ready wit. This nobleman 
 and myself were continually together, and his 
 abilities and pleasant society quite delighted 
 me. He soon perceived the easy and unsus- 
 pecting disposition which marked me for the 
 prey of the designing, and seemed to tak€ a 
 kind and deep interest in my welfare, for 
 which I was grateful, and thus I was laid 
 open to his deceitful plans. Amongst other 
 good offices he cautioned me against all mi-
 
 THE TURF. 187 
 
 nor gamesters, and assured me that under his 
 advice and guidance I should come to no 
 harm. 
 
 " Little did I dream that under the garb of 
 sincere regard he would sacrifice me to his own 
 interested ends ; but not long after this bro- 
 therly conduct and salutary advice, he made 
 me his prey for many thousands ; the artifice 
 was effected by a party made purposely for 
 me, which, in concert with their noble con- 
 ductor, relieved me of a large sum of 
 money. 
 
 " This ought to have opened my eyes, and 
 to have deterred me from play for the rest of 
 my life, but unfortunately it was otherwise. I 
 have no command of myself, as the sequel will 
 prove. I was frequently pigeoned for different 
 sums; but of all that I ever lost, although the 
 sum did not exceed ten thousand pounds, I 
 never regretted any loss so much as the one 
 in question to two individuals, the one an
 
 188 THE TURF. 
 
 honourable and the other a senatorial gen- 
 tleman." 
 
 Here Lord Letterfield paused awhile, as if 
 in painful reflection. 
 
 " When the lower orders," resumed he, 
 " stoop to acts of dishonour and treachery, 
 from habit or from necessity, one wonders little 
 at ii; but that the aristocracy of the country 
 should descend to such degrading means is 
 dreadful indeed." 
 
 Lord Dorimont was surprised at this re- 
 flection from one who still fell into the same 
 snare ; but it is one thing to think and an- 
 other thing to act, and in play matters the 
 most sensible men act the most foolishly. 
 There is a flush which comes over a man 
 when cards and dice are introduced, which 
 to an habitual play-man is irresistible. Cau- 
 tion and resolution soon desert the mind. 
 Resolution is to a play-man what a vow made 
 is to a drunkard, one bottle or one game
 
 THE TURF. 189 
 
 more, and then Reason gives up the helm, 
 and the Passions drive our fragile bark to de- 
 struction. 
 
 There is also a pride in play as well as in 
 love, which the want of success irritates and 
 increases ; no man has the good sense to part 
 in good humour with misfortune any more 
 than with Miss any thing-else: a desire to 
 win, ambition to surmount defeat, an obsti- 
 nacy in persevering until a change takes 
 place — all these fire the brain, and, as the 
 French say, qui a bu, boirua, so we may say, 
 qui a joue, jouira. 
 
 We remember a withering woman of gal- 
 lantry, a Contesse d' Autrefois, who very pro- 
 perly asserted that gaming was the only vice 
 which was radically incurable. " Immoderate 
 love," said she, " cures itself, for" (to use her 
 own words) " when Cupid loses his wings he 
 must cease to be volage. Ambition may be 
 sated by power, or even surfeited by it ; 
 drunkenness may give way to remonstrance,
 
 190 THE TURF. 
 
 love, interest, or the cessation of strength ; 
 but time and place, youth and age, sickness 
 or health, no change will affect the man of 
 play as long as he can get money or credit to 
 satisfy his habitual penchant." 
 
 In repeating this, however, we do not mean 
 to assert that Lord Letterfield is incurable ; 
 other society and more powerful attraction 
 may, we hope, yet extricate him from the 
 entanglement, which has hampered older and 
 wiser men than his Lordship. 
 
 We could say a great deal in addition to 
 this young noblemen's confessions to his 
 friend, particularly about his being the victim 
 of his unguardedness at certain races of which 
 he was the steward; and when elate with 
 warm feeling, and elevated by wine and po- 
 pular applause, he was led to play for a very 
 heavy sum — which he lost. 
 
 But it is not our wish to place before a 
 generous heart the cold reproach of the un-
 
 THE TURF. 191 
 
 tempted calculator ; he or she only who has 
 been tried can speak of the ascendancy over 
 temptation. Applause is nearly as intoxicating 
 as wine, and far more dangerous; for the 
 latter may steep the senses in a soporific po- 
 tion, but vanitVj ever awake to applause, 
 carries us to that fever which brings on deli- 
 rium ; so that he who was wise in tranquil life 
 grows mad by the flattery of the herd. 
 
 When Blucher, PlatofF, and the other 
 heroes which the allied crowned heads im- 
 ported with them, appeared in our gaping, 
 wondering metropolis, the former said, by ac- 
 cident and defective pronunciation, what 
 many a popular leader and favourite of the 
 day might in verity repeat. Pressed by the 
 crowd so closely in Hyde Park that he could 
 scarcely manage his horse or move, and over- 
 come with heat and admiration, he alighted 
 from his steed and put his back against a 
 tree, from whence he addressed the crowd.
 
 192 THE TURF. 
 
 acknowledging with thankfulness their atten- 
 tions, but soliciting to be relieved from them, 
 and to be allowed to retire without further 
 proofs of their warmth : his address began with 
 " My friends, I am very great fool, I am very 
 great fool, I am very great fool for your kind- 
 ness ; " by this he meant very grateful, the 
 emphasis being thus misplaced. 
 
 But as many a true word is spoken in jest, 
 so might the same stress laid upon the wrong 
 syllable speak nothing but the truth of him 
 who, inflamed by popular applause or tem- 
 porary success at play, gives up the reins of 
 prudence. 
 
 One word more ere we quit this subject. 
 The Peer complained of being sacrificed 
 under the mask of friendship. This is the 
 surest game; if a man can be guarded against 
 his soi-disant friends, he will have much less 
 to fear from his enemies. 
 
 The conversation between the friends was
 
 THE TURF. 193 
 
 ended by a momentary silence, an elevation 
 of the eye-brows, and a shrug of the shoulders 
 on the part of Lord Letterfield, which spoke 
 a whole sentence at full length. These pan- 
 tomimic representations of thought are very 
 convenient and effective ; they tell surprise, 
 resignation, disgust, or the pazienzia per 
 forza admirably. 
 
 Time was that John Bull had such an anti- 
 Gall ican head and shoulders, that a shake of 
 the head or a shrug of the shoulders would 
 have seemed quite to compromise his dignity 
 and to affect his patriotism, or what is called 
 true British feeling, alias no feeling at all. 
 But now, thanks to our intercourse with the 
 continent, we are as active and as animated 
 as any body; our beaux and belles now suit the 
 action to the word, and are quite degourdes ; 
 whereas in the olden time an Englishman's 
 hands were like our sinecurists, occupying 
 place without having anything to do for it, 
 
 VOL. I. o
 
 194 THE TURF. 
 
 except occasionally pocketing the cash: at 
 all other times " what a man's right hand 
 did his left hand did not know," for they 
 were so distant, cold, stiff, and motionless, 
 that they seemed quite strangers to each 
 other. 
 
 By the way we are a little defective and 
 ungraceful in the management of our arms 
 (not in the field, where they perform wonders, 
 but in the cabinet) ; and in both houses of 
 Parliament our speaking member, when he 
 has a motion] to make, is very apt to thrust 
 one hand into his pocket or bosom, or to 
 dangle it like a pump-handle by his side, 
 whilst the other feebly lays down the law, or is 
 extended towards the Speaker. Now if there 
 were great weight or substance in the honour- 
 able gentleman last speaking, the hand in the 
 pocket might be accounted for ; or if the ad- 
 dress came from the heart, then the introduc- 
 tion of one palm into the bosom would be very
 
 THE TURF. 195 
 
 appropriate ; but as there is often nothing in 
 either, these gestures and attitudes mean no- 
 thing at all : a little more stage effect would 
 not be amiss, a little more grace would be 
 more dignified. However, a petition or the 
 rough draft of a bill are convenient things for 
 a man to go before the public with, although 
 iw private life they are extremely troublesome 
 and unacceptable even to an M. P. or a Peer 
 of the realm. 
 
 Talking of gesture and action we must 
 notice the arrival of a certain Marquis from 
 the opposite coast, who made his first visit 
 to Newmarket, a very good-tempered fellow, 
 and fond of the English, but neither over- 
 burthened with cash, or with a knowledge of 
 our language. The deficiency was, however, 
 supplied by confidence, which made his lan- 
 guage truly ludicrous and mirth-making. He 
 was known to Lords Dorimont and Letterfield 
 in Paris, and particularly so to the Countess, 
 o 2
 
 196 THE TURF. 
 
 whose soirees he used to attend. Up he 
 came to the friends on the ground, with an 
 air degage, Hterally translating French into 
 Enghsh, which often has a very strange 
 effect. 
 
 " Ah ! behold you, three gentlemen ; I 
 wish you the good day. < Ah ! vous voila. 
 Messieurs ; je vous souhaite le bon jourJ I 
 come from arriving at the instant from Lon- 
 don. ' Je viens cTarriver a Vinstant de Lon- 
 dres.'" 
 
 Mutual salutations having taken place, the 
 two friends inquired how he liked town. 
 
 '' So, so. I arrive on a Sunday, when 
 every one was as dull as a night-cap. ' Triste 
 comme un bonnet de nuiV No play, no ball, 
 no opera.*' 
 
 *' Where did you take up your quar- 
 ters?" 
 
 Not being able to give the English name, 
 he replied, " A Vhomme vert et tranquille, a
 
 THE TURF. 197 
 
 Oxford ;" meaning the Green Man and Still 
 in Oxford-street. 
 
 Lord Letterfield was convulsed with laugh- 
 ter. " And who on earth could have recom- 
 mended you to such a house ? " 
 
 He told them that it was one of the Gardes 
 du Corps, who had passed a week in London, 
 and had found it was more ship (cheaper) 
 than the first class of hotels ; but, continued 
 the Marquis, " they overdo even there." 
 " lis surf out, every body overdo, the land- 
 lady, the chambermaid, the waiter. Mon- 
 sieur Boots, and all of them ; not content to 
 pay your bed, de payer voire lit, so much, 
 there is a regiment of servants to satisfy 
 besides." 
 
 " How came you here ? " asked Lord Do- 
 rimont. 
 
 " By the carriage public; par la voiture 
 publique," 
 
 *' What company had you ? "
 
 198 THE TURF. 
 
 " One lady, who I found a very doll.'* 
 (very dull) 
 
 More bursts of laughter — what a pretty 
 plan, a walking gentleman from the Green 
 Man and Still to visit a race-course ! 
 
 The good-natured peer now gave him a 
 horse to ride, an apartment to sleep in, and 
 Lord Dorimont took charge of him for la 
 nourriture, he having complained that life 
 was so dear, that he must soon depart. " La 
 vie ttait si chere^ quHlfallait quHl parteJ* 
 
 Their inquiries were now naturally direct- 
 ed to what was actually going on in Paris 
 among their acquaintance there. In reply, 
 the Marquis informed them that all was going 
 on in the usual way, but that the Turf was be- 
 coming daily more and more in vogue in 
 Paris and all over the continent ; the races 
 at Naples were very brilliant ; English horses 
 and jockies were to be met with in all direc- 
 tions in France and Italy ; an exportation of
 
 THE TURF. 199 
 
 the legs would be very beneficial to old 
 England, but money is not so come-at-able 
 abroad as at home ; nevertheless, we may ex- 
 pect to find our jockies and trainers, in 
 course of time, having a touch of French 
 varnish and other foreign polish as well as 
 their masters, and hear French and Italian 
 spoken in our race-courses and in our racing- 
 stables. 
 
 The rage for English horses and the four- 
 in-hands were augmenting in number, and 
 promised to muster in strength for Longchamp, 
 " The elegants of Paris," observed the Mar- 
 quis, " make no case of you fne font pas cas 
 de vousj if you have not a four-in-hand 
 turn out, besides your cabriolet and riding 
 horses." 
 
 " This must be a hard case to many, and 
 a case of chagrin to some," remarked Lord 
 Dorimont, which with an account given of 
 young Count Tadpole's piebald team, termi-
 
 200 THE TURF. 
 
 nated the conversation with the sprightly 
 Gaul. 
 
 This Tadpole is a fortunate youth, who 
 always falls on his feet, although the natural 
 son of an old miser ; he was made a Visconte 
 during papa's life, after which he was erased 
 from the list of French nobility, on ac- 
 count of the expose of his bastardy ; but he 
 travelled to Italy, and purchased a higher 
 title, and now starts again fresher than ever ; 
 a maudit law-suit came in and deprived him 
 of a great part of the old man's wealth, yet 
 does he contrive to keep up his original 
 splendour, both in Paris and at his chateau in 
 the country. It is but justice to Tad to say 
 that he is a right good whip ; no better in 
 Paris, perhaps in Europe, and the intricate 
 streets of that metropolis are no joke to rattle 
 through as he does : at night his cabriolet 
 and lighted cigar denote la bonne aventure, 
 and then " Ah, gardez vous, burger ette ! bur- 
 gerette, gardez vous ! "
 
 THE TUIIF. 201 
 
 By this time the Countess had arrived; she 
 was lodged decorously in a separate house'; 
 her suite was en princesse, and every eye was 
 in admiration on her. 
 
 Lord Dorimont and his noble companion 
 attended her arrival, and welcomed her to 
 the approaching sports; she had also held, 
 shortly after, quite a levy of rank and fashion. 
 These temporary triumphs hoodwink the vic- 
 tims who afterwards fall by them. 
 
 The easy Peer had still great hopes of 
 winning at the meeting, and was somewhat 
 sanguine ; our hero was cool and collected, 
 nearly certain of his mark, but seemingly in- 
 different about it ; a parley with trainer and 
 jockey, and a splendid repast chez Madame, 
 concluded the day. 
 
 After leaving la belle, the friends looked in at 
 the rooms to see how things were going. Mo- 
 ney was flying about, but not in the direction 
 of the almost constantly losing Lord. Lord
 
 202 THE TURF. 
 
 Dorimont won some loose gold, which he did 
 not count; these small matters were now 
 below his notice; he had greater game in view, 
 although not at the race-course; but the 
 great dream of ambition was still to come 
 true, and he never lost sight of it. 
 
 All the frequenters of Newmarket know 
 what the rooms are, so it will be needless to 
 enter into any particular detail ; without play 
 Newmai'ket would be incomplete ; this unfor- 
 tunately facilitates a great transfer of property 
 from one pocket and person to another; 
 thus the gains of a race frequently disappear 
 at the table. 
 
 But this only occurs to gentlemen, we 
 mean honourable men, fair players ; the legs 
 being secure and active parties on the turf 
 and at the table. As instance of what we 
 have asserted, we remember the late G. P. 
 who concluded his career in the rules of the 
 Bench, having won five thousand pounds at
 
 THE TURF. 203 
 
 Bilbury races, which he lost at the hazard 
 table; from thence he repaired to London 
 with as much as would purchase a ticket and 
 hire a domino ; he set off post for a masque- 
 rade, having a five pound note in his pocket ; 
 of this the light-fingered gentry eased him, 
 — laudo finem !
 
 204 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 Wisely, and slow; he stumbles that runs fast.*' 
 
 SHAKSPEARE. 
 
 With these remembrances in our mind, 
 we are obliged to call a halt, as we perceive 
 that we have got over the ground so rapidly 
 that a word or two of explanatory matter 
 becomes necessary; we will, therefore, in the 
 sporting language, " try back," and thus 
 account for the introduction of Banco, not 
 as a ghost, but as a banker, as large as life.
 
 THE TURF. 205 
 
 We had forgotten, in our general state- 
 ment of the prosperity which attended Lord 
 Dorimontj (and which was owing not only to 
 the extent of his fortune, but to that of his 
 prudence, caution, abilities, and experience,) 
 to state that he had a second heavy check 
 similar to that which he was nearly having 
 with the veteran Marquis. In the second 
 instance he had to pay. However, he soon 
 after recovered himself, and this was his 
 last heavy loss : all was plain sailing after- 
 wards. 
 
 It happened that in the round of amuse- 
 ments, and acquaintances which they procure 
 a man, that he fell in with a banker, of the 
 name of Rowley Robinson, a great lover of 
 play, and as great an amateur of the fair 
 sex. 
 
 Bankers are not what they used to be in 
 the olden times, good, plain business-like 
 men. Your great folks will not now bank
 
 206 THE TURF. 
 
 with a firm unless some one of the partners, 
 if not all, live in a style of elegance. A car- 
 riage and four is now a great inducement to 
 open an account with a bank ; splendid town 
 and country residences, at a certain becom- 
 ing distance from the banking-house, inspire 
 confidence in customers ; the evening parties 
 of the banker's lady, not forgetting dinners 
 in a superior style, attract openers of ac- 
 counts ; a box at the Opera is as a plum in 
 the Stocks to the copartnery; nay, even a 
 kept mistress attached to a junior partner, is 
 no drawback ; she is only a sleeping partner, 
 and her appearance will please young hands, 
 who will bank at the house, because the ju- 
 nior partner is a fine fellow, and lives as he 
 ought to do. 
 
 It is true that there are certain old quizzes 
 who look to the safety of their cash and plate, 
 and to all valuable deposits of deeds, bonds, 
 and other securities. Such men suspect
 
 THE TURF. 207 
 
 these showy appearances as the forerunners 
 of a crash ; they do not relish the expensive 
 style of him who is to be the safe guardian 
 of property, nor do they much admire the 
 supporting horses without working them per- 
 sonally, nor keeping a mistress by proxy. 
 
 But they must know very little of the town 
 who think thus ; for half the carriage ladies 
 are thus supported on money won, entrusted 
 to care, or obtained through the tradesman 
 in the shape of goods; the other half are 
 maintained by married men, who make them 
 the locum tenens of their superannuated, 
 or deserted legitimate spouses; — alas, what 
 times'! 
 
 Rowley Robinson, whom we shall in future 
 call Banco, for shortness sake, got introduced 
 to the Countess, and by making supper for 
 her after the Opera, and other attentions to 
 her and her lover, greatly ingratiated himself 
 with the latter. This led to mutual dinners;
 
 208 THE TURF. 
 
 mutual dinners led to play; and the confi- 
 dence which reigned on all these occasions, 
 threw Lord Dorimont off his guard, and su- 
 perinduced very heavy losses, luck running 
 against him. 
 
 The greatest general has his moment of 
 incaution; Arthur, not of the round table, 
 but at the round table, is as mcautious as 
 any one; nay even in the field of victory, when 
 fortune was once very near deserting him : 
 so uncertain and capricious are they both ! 
 
 To Banco our hero lost heavy sums; no 
 wonder, for in these festive scenes the heart 
 is open. Champagne sparkles, and so does 
 beauty's eye; smiles smooth the frown of 
 care and suspicion, the pulse beats high, 
 and when our vessels are full, we know- 
 not of what stuff a man must be made, 
 who has room in his bosom for prudence 
 and precaution ; he may, in the language of 
 our excellent and anacreontic poet, resolve.
 
 THE TURF. 209 
 
 ** Wlien wise, to keep (his) bosom locked ;'* 
 but he will not fail " to turn the key when 
 tipsy." Even the greatest misers have felt 
 expansion of heart when surrounded by 
 women and wine, although it failed not to 
 collapse when the warmth and flush sub- 
 sided. 
 
 We only state this to justify our hero's 
 departing from his general rule, and to ad- 
 mire his recovering at Newmarket what he 
 lost to Banco. Now, a word about the ban- 
 ker himself. Banco was a partner in a certain 
 firm in the city : he was celebrated in the 
 theatrical world for his recherche dinners, 
 for his various houses in the country, for the 
 witty and pleasant company whom he con-» 
 trived to collect at his table, and for the 
 beautiful and attractive actresses whom he 
 patronized largely, and " though last not 
 least in our dear love," the lovely interesting 
 married dames, who were separated from 
 
 VOL. I. p
 
 210 THE TURF. 
 
 their lords and husbands, and who formed a 
 gallaxy of transcendance at his happy board. 
 Of this class were Mrs. Reynard Long, the at- 
 tractive ci-divant ballatrice, Mrs. Ricondarto, 
 and Mrs. Everbloom. 
 
 The dinners, suppers, and soirees had great 
 charms for our hero ; and it is confidently 
 asserted that Mrs. Reynard Long's bright 
 «yes made a deep impression on him. The 
 banker's urbanity and good cheer fanned 
 the flame which female charms had enkin- 
 dled, and begot such ample confidence in 
 Banco, that Lord Dorimont trusted him im- 
 plicitly, and played with him in boundless 
 fiecurity. 
 
 . I No wonder, therefore, that his losses were 
 so extensive, for he not only lost to him at 
 the table, where luck was against him,* but 
 
 * We believe that his play-transactions were quite 
 fair ; his expenses were enough to luin him alone.
 
 THE TURF. 211 
 
 he also placed money in his hands, although 
 he was not his regular banker ; the Countess 
 and many other females did the same, he 
 having the confidence of both sexes, and 
 having something very taking about him to 
 all sexes, ranks, and denominations. 
 
 He must have had hard v^^ork to keep up 
 his credit in the east, and to glitter at night 
 in the west, flattering and entertaining nobi- 
 lity, gentry, and professional people; he 
 must have been no bad financier to have 
 squared his accounts even for the period of 
 his apparent deceptive prosperity; business 
 and pleasure must have strangely contended 
 for preference with him, and his head must 
 have been long and cool, which served him 
 aUke in the revel and at the desk. 
 
 Be that as it may, he kept up the farce for 
 
 years, admired and respected, played upon 
 
 and playing on others, amassing with one 
 
 hand and scattering with the other: but 
 
 p2
 
 212 THE TURF. 
 
 this game could not always last ; it was mar-^ 
 vellous that it held out so long. 
 
 At last the day arrived when the veil was 
 to be torn from the false appearance of 
 wealth and credit; when public exposure 
 was to succeed public confidence; and when 
 general regret and horror were to supplant 
 private friendships and the possession of fair 
 fame. 
 
 We do not know nor care who was the 
 first to discover Banco's failure and flight; 
 what long face first turned pale and speech- 
 less at the blowing up of the bubble. Suffice 
 it for us to chronicle the announcement of it 
 to our hero, and the effect which it had on 
 his nerves and on his conduct. 
 
 One morning, ere he rang his bell, his 
 valet ventured to open his chamber-door 
 gently, being full of the wonder of the day, 
 and being one of those sieves that let all se- 
 crets through, as well as the current reports
 
 THE TURF. 213 
 
 or established facts, in the form of the news 
 of the day. Seeing his master moving he ap- 
 proached the bed-side with, " Sir, wliat do 
 you think of Mr. Rowley Robinson ? " 
 
 " Nothing at all." 
 
 " Well, Sir, he is come to nothing." 
 
 " How do you mean? Is he no more ? Has 
 he put an end to himself, or what ? " 
 
 " Sir, he has failed to an enormous amount : 
 he has hit every body, great and small, ruined 
 whole families, dished hundreds of people. 
 He has also absconded; there is nothing 
 to be heard of but his failure — there never 
 was anything like it — it's downright shock- 
 ing." 
 
 Lord Dorimont, seeing that his man was 
 likely to be wordy and to delay his rising, cut 
 him short by calling for his dressing appara- 
 tus; the valet, however, could not refrain 
 from resuming in an humbler tone — 
 
 " I hope, Sir, you are not a great loser by
 
 214 THE TURF. 
 
 him ? He must be a great rascal to have de- 
 ceived you so." 
 
 " Not much," replied Lord Dorimont, 
 " get my hot water. I might," added he to 
 himself, " have foreseen this event; but the 
 fellow was so pleasant and plausible ! It will be 
 an additional lesson to me ; and although it 
 has cost me many thousands, it will be worth 
 its price in the end : I must make it up some- 
 how or other." 
 
 Such was the coolness of our hero. It 
 would be well if other turf and sporting men, 
 in all the branches of play and speculation, 
 could take a leaf out of his book. It is true 
 that his capital was still extensive ; a weaker 
 one might have left him in ruin ; but even 
 then a genius, steadiness, and courage like 
 his, might have surmounted any obstacle, and 
 recovered any loss. 
 
 As he was taking his chocolate, he con- 
 cocted a future plan for winning back his
 
 THE TURF. g.l$ 
 
 losses. Newmarket offered an opening to 
 him, and he soon put into practice the de- 
 signs which he conceived. There, surrounded 
 by enemies, as every rich man is, he took up 
 his stand.
 
 216 THE TURF. 
 
 CHAPTER X, 
 
 Legs, have at ye all I 
 
 Although the reader has already had a 
 pretty specimen of these gentry, we must beg 
 leave to show up some few more yet. The 
 menagerie of birds of prey ought to be known 
 by head-mark ; and it shall not be our fault if 
 this collection is not pretty accurately de- 
 scribed. Doubtless young birds succeed the 
 old ones ; but the breed is still the same, and
 
 THE TURF. SIT 
 
 one race is just as honest as the other ; they 
 differ in ability, but there is a glorious resem- 
 blance in inclination. 
 
 There was a fine importation of them at 
 Newmarket at this meeting ; the Greek co- 
 horts were arrived, and business was to begin 
 the next day. We say " business," because 
 the turf has now become a complete affair of 
 business, and your sporting men of the old 
 school are really men of business. All sports 
 are now made subservient to gain, so that per- 
 sons of rank and fashion, as well as seeming 
 idlers and real adventurers, count upon the 
 turf. Any sport, in which a man has an 
 ascendancy over others, is a regular part 
 of his rent-roll. Some collect the rent on 
 the turf; others by cards and dice ; one showy 
 fellow has a share in a hell ; another is the 
 sharer and bet-taker of a friend ; here a man 
 is matched against time, and lives by pedes- 
 trianism j there another rides for his life, or
 
 218 THE TURF. 
 
 his livelihood ; a third turns his head to gold 
 by pigeon shooting ; but the great bulk raise 
 the wind by pigeon plucking. 
 
 Of aU these there was now at Newmarket 
 a large proportion, and a certain sprinkling 
 of nobility. Happily for the honourable men 
 on the turf, there are yet noblemen who give 
 a sanction to the amusements, and who pa- 
 tronise aU that is fair. Newmarket draws 
 from Cambridge a race of young turf-men, 
 and the celebrity of its course still makes it 
 stand high. 
 
 The death of a certain royal Duke has 
 caused a sad blank there ,* in his demise the 
 army has sustained a great misfortune, and 
 the turf has lost a patron. A good many of 
 the old hands too are dropping off; but still 
 some of the thoroughbred ones are now to be 
 found. Newmarket is not a show-ground 
 like Epsom or Ascot; but it is a great place 
 for business, and a real sporting-course. The-
 
 THE TURF. ^Id 
 
 company is not so mixed as on the other two 
 grounds, because female quahty and idhng 
 Lords and Commons do not come so far 
 merely for a sight, not having the town 
 amusements to retire upon at night ; and the 
 spruce tradesmen and their families east of 
 Temple-Bar, cannot spare the time from 
 their business. The lower orders also can- 
 not manage the needful for such a journey ; 
 but all descriptions of sharps, and sharpers, 
 gamblers, chaunters, pick-pockets, hell-keep- 
 ers, eo-table and garter-pricking trampers, 
 and informers, all attend regularly here as 
 well as at other races ; the high class of flats 
 and sharps retiring to the great pandemo- 
 nium in the evenings, the lesser ones prowl- 
 ing about at night, seeking to entrap the 
 unwary stranger or bumkin. Low matches at 
 cards, dice, pugilizing, and trick-playing are 
 made, in which the Johnny Raw is sure to 
 be cleaned out, if the pick-pockets have left
 
 220 THE TURF. 
 
 him a bob* or a foglef to play with; so 
 that a race-course, as well as a fair, is now 
 become a complete resort for thieves, high 
 and low, from an Honourable leg down to 
 the reputed depredators marked by the po- 
 lice, and stagged in their operations. 
 
 A fine day, although cold, drew an addi- 
 tional number of visitors to the course. Of 
 the females, many were the fair protegees of 
 the patrician and other Greeks; some wer6 
 supported by a firm (whether of a bank 
 gaming- stock, or otherwise, matters not) ; 
 others were republicans. On these, titled 
 demireps and mysterious mistresses bent their 
 disdainful looks; whilst rival beaux paid 
 passing homage to their charms, and seemed 
 to derive importance from the warm smile 
 which might indicate a welcome, or betray a 
 
 * Bob, a shilling. 
 
 f A pocket-handkerchief.
 
 THE TURF. 221 
 
 penchant; and we are sorry to add, that the 
 lovers of the present age are too apt to talk 
 of that which honour should induce them to 
 conceal. Happy would it be for the softer 
 sex, if they were aware that such flatterers 
 love them more from conceit than sentiment, 
 and that their apparent preference springs 
 from the most selfish motives ! 
 
 Amongst the fair ones who graced the 
 course, was a bella Principessa of diplomatic 
 celebrity. Her Highnesses politics, however, 
 are suspected to be quite opposite to those of the 
 great man her happy spouse, whose political 
 creed is made up of legitimacy, sacred rights, 
 absolute government, and inviolability. Now 
 there is something cold, systematical, tyranni- 
 cal, and oppressive in all this, in his splendid 
 consort's eyes, and she is, if we may believe 
 the numerous on dlts on the subject, a vraie 
 liberale. N'irnporte, they manage these mat- 
 ters much better abroad.
 
 223 THE TURF. 
 
 Lady S 's splendid turn-out pulled up 
 
 near her Highnesses, and hard by was the 
 Countess Victorine, (for we must not make 
 free with her family name). She was well sur- 
 rounded, a thing decidedly necessary to give 
 eclat to an appearance in public. A beauty 
 ought to have at least ten times as many 
 humble servants in the shape of slaves, and 
 cavalieri serventi, as her number of livery 
 servants amounts to. In Spain these cava- 
 liers are knee-bending, ogling, sighing, and 
 dying swains; but in free and merry England, 
 they are nodding, smiling, lisping, nonsense- 
 talking, and hand-squeezing things; the 
 amount of whose conversation seldom exceeds 
 zero. " Fine day. Countess." " Ha ! you are 
 come at last; who do you wish for?" 
 " Strange weather ; hot in the sun, and cold 
 in the shade." " What a crowded course ! 
 Who is our new friend ?" " A fresh face, 
 by all that's pretty. I wonder who suffers?"
 
 THE TURF. 223 
 
 " Have you heard what horse is the fa- 
 vourite?" "Just come? So am I." "Thought 
 I should be too late." " Well, what a 
 crowd ; let us get clear of this mob :" with 
 other little phrases equally interesting. This 
 is the general amount of these buzzers' small 
 talk ; some have not time or talent for more ; 
 for if they are interested in the race, business 
 must be attended to exclusively. 
 
 Lord Clan Erin was one of those who rode 
 up to the Countess's carriage; he was fol- 
 lowed by Sir Charles Hazard, and they ex- 
 changed a familiar recognition ; for they are 
 accounted friends, although on one occasion 
 the service rendered by the former to the 
 latter was anything but friendly. It has 
 often been remarked, that a man ought to 
 guard against his friends, because he will 
 naturally look to and provide against his 
 enemies. The noble Lord had better not 
 have called upon his friend for an explana-
 
 224t THE TURF. 
 
 tion ; his memory must have ill served him 
 upon this occasion. He is full of good na- 
 ture, but not quite deficient in remembrance. 
 The peer had better have trusted to his title, 
 as many men do, than have entered into a 
 lengthy correspondence in the public prints, 
 little interesting to the public in general, highly 
 annoying to a great public character, and 
 unsatisfactory to all parties concerned. 
 
 Here was Tim O'Botherem again. Like 
 his countrymen, he was always making bulls, 
 in the shape of mistakes. Lord Dorimont 
 recollected, that when quite a youngster, he 
 had a bet with him, which on his lordship 
 demanding (having won it) Tim swore was 
 a mistake, not having as he said made any 
 bet the previous day. During the alterca- 
 tion, a young Cantab came up and demanded 
 a similar bet ; upon which Tim quietly turned 
 
 round and said, " By J s, it is another 
 
 mistake !" Tim's want of memory caused his.
 
 THE TURF. 225 
 
 young friends to come off minus ; but both 
 their recollections and his serve them better 
 at the present day. 
 
 Amongst the former and present keepers 
 of play establishments, Messrs. Oldplan and 
 Bennett made their appearance. They have 
 realized large sums. The latter has been 
 known often to do a kind and charitable 
 action ; but the other has not a single re- 
 deeming quality as an offset for the avarice, 
 rapacity, and heartlessness, which too often 
 characterise the chiefs of these hellish esta^ 
 blishments. 
 
 Iteriim Crispinus ! here was the farrier 
 again, and mischief of course was hatching. 
 He had again been tampering with a jockey, 
 but the jockey had been already bought by 
 another party on a different plan; so that old 
 Sandcrack came a day too late. 
 
 There was nothing very memorable in this 
 day's sport, but an extraordinary swerve, 
 
 VOL. I. Q
 
 2M: THE TURF. 
 
 and some extraordinary private matches* By 
 the latter our hero was a considerable win- 
 ner, and by the race he nearly brought 
 himself home. It was not, however, by his 
 horse's winning (although all was fair) that 
 he looked for gain. He knew there was a 
 robbery, and, being apprized of it, he was 
 not its dupe. 
 
 ' The day passed off very well ; Lord Dori- 
 mont dined with Lord Shafto, whose cook is 
 pronounced to be the best in the world : so 
 Lord Verity said, whose word may be taken 
 for a dinner at least, and who has proved 
 himself to be a man of imagination by his 
 late literary productions. 
 
 Titled authors are all the rage; their con- 
 ceptions are so vivid, they see so much of 
 high life, where romancing is so common, 
 and where they can so conveniently cut up a 
 friend, all in the way of authorship. Who 
 would, in this age, be accounted a plain mat-
 
 THE TURF. 227 
 
 ter-of-fact man? Certainly not Lord Verity;* 
 his imagination is too vivid for this, his ha- 
 bits are too grand, his shots too long, his 
 imagination too fertile. 
 
 We now come to Lord Dorimont's £:reat 
 recovery on the second day's races. The 
 heavy losses sustained by the fugitive banker 
 were still fresh in our hero's mind; his two 
 
 * Lord Verity is the son of an Irishman, who 
 succeeded his ancle, an old profligate lord, who 
 served in the French service, and who had a great deal 
 of trouble in fishing out his red-headed hopeful heir 
 from a shebean-house, or other hovel in Shamrock- 
 shire. The old man left the unknown-looking boy 
 his blessing and a limited property, conjuring him to 
 become quite the gentleman, and never to change his 
 religion. The Lord in question never attained the 
 first object, and lost no time in abjuring the second 
 for the love of the lucre of gain. His lady-mother's life 
 and habits are pretty well known ; probably, how- 
 ever. Lord Verity inherits her lively imagination an^^ 
 flights of fancy. 
 
 82
 
 228 THE TURF. 
 
 enormously expensive establishments of town 
 and country, besides his quarters at Steevens's, 
 were a constant and heavy drain upon his 
 purse ; and lastly, being determined never to 
 touch upon capital, or to encumber his pro- 
 perty, a coup at Newmarket was absolutely 
 necessary to retrieve the past, and to put him 
 in the flourishing condition which he had 
 previously enjoyed. 
 
 The day was now arrived — his stud was 
 the best on the turf — several young ones 
 coming out of the first blood, purchased at 
 considerable expense, being amongst them. 
 One in particular, which had beaten Pre- 
 mier in a trial, and offered a fine field for 
 speculation, was engaged in some produce- 
 stakes with Codrington ; this last horse was 
 heavily backed to win against the field. 
 Lord Dorimont was too good a judge to 
 back his own horse, but stood heavily against 
 all the rest, Codrington in particular ; his
 
 THE TURF. 229 
 
 bets were freely taken by all the sporting 
 men, as he had been tried with the winner 
 of a Derby, the property of a sporting 
 man, and had been borrowed by a noble- 
 man, the owner of Codrington, for that 
 purpose. 
 
 Our hero's trainer, whose judgment he 
 always took, and on whom he could impli- 
 citly rely, had but a very mean opinion of 
 the horse, and suspected it was some new 
 robbery got up by the legs ; he was sure in 
 his own mind that all was not right, and he 
 intimated these suspicions to his master, who 
 resolved to act upon them. Never was New- 
 market fuller, never was interest raised higher : 
 all eyes were upon the favourite — all anxious 
 to see this wonderful flyer, who was to outdo 
 all former outdoings. This was his first pub- 
 lic appearance ; some said he was the finest 
 gallopper ever seen, and all were eager to 
 back him. His master and his eldest son
 
 230 THE TURF. 
 
 came three hundred miles to see him run 
 and win, whilst Lord Dorimont's colt was 
 thought nothing of, and on this day of the 
 race he took the odds to a very large 
 amount. 
 
 The race turned out as Lord Dorimont 
 and his trainer had expected, owing to the 
 caution of the former, and the vigilance and 
 consequent valuable information of the latter. 
 The celebrated Codrington was beat in the 
 first half mile, our hero's colt winning in a 
 canter, so that his Lordship netted some 
 thousands by the race. Many found to their 
 cost the humbug of Codrington; all the 
 little betters suffered severely, and some of 
 the higher venturers were bit to the tune of 
 many thousands. As no doubt the celebrated 
 horse Corsair had at least two pails of water 
 before the trial, the party in the secret made 
 a good thing of it, and a better managed 
 business never was got up..
 
 THE TURF. 231 
 
 What a contrast of looks of triumph and 
 dejection might be observed in quitting the 
 course ; what a hoaxing expression charac- 
 terized those who had hatched the plot, or 
 were let into it; how changed were the notes 
 of the knowing ones who were taken in — - 
 changed, indeed, until some of them had 
 scarcely small change to give. 
 
 On the night of this memorable day to the 
 turf, the rooms were crowded, and heavy 
 play commenced at an early hour. Our hero, 
 who was an excellent player at all games, 
 came down with the intention of devoting his 
 time to business, and of turning his savoir to 
 the best account. At this time there were 
 very few new faces, which made the turf dull. 
 In fact. Lord Dorimont found none except 
 his friend Lord L — and Sir Thomas Gatton. 
 The former he regretted to find, after all the 
 good advice given to him, playing at ecarti 
 with a hoary-headed old gentleman. Major
 
 232 THE TURF. 
 
 Strawberry. This man had previously ruined 
 a number of people, and had won and lost 
 thousands; for at one time he was worth 
 nearly a plum, and was then accounted de- 
 cidedly the best player in England ; but ava- 
 rice and self-conceit proved his ruin. He 
 thought himself so superior at piquet, that 
 he had the vanity and obstinacy to give the 
 deal to nearly as good a player as himself. 
 The whole field was against him, and at the 
 end of three weeks sixty thousand of his 
 ready money was gone, and bonds to a con- 
 siderable amount were lodged in the hands of 
 the brother of a celebrated Countess. Straw- 
 berry had at the time a small demand on 
 these bonds, and was so anxious to get the 
 amount of Mr. Thomson (the Countess's 
 brother), that the following anecdote is told 
 of him. 
 
 His eagerness to get the money in ques- 
 Uon induced him to call personally at Mr*
 
 THE TURF. 
 
 Thomson's house, and insist on seeing him ; 
 but Mr. T. being fearful that if he parted 
 with this security he might never see the 
 bonds again, determined on not being at 
 home to him, and was accordingly denied: 
 but old Strawberry was not to be got rid of 
 thus ; and having once made his lodgment 
 good, remained the whole of that day and night 
 and the following day, having taken posses- 
 sion of the house with the determination to 
 carry his point. 
 
 Mr. Thomson's talented sister, seeing that 
 there was no chance of getting rid of him, 
 requested an interview, and informed him 
 that there was no probability of her brother's 
 return. Nevertheless, Strawberry repeated 
 his resolution to remain ; on which the Coun- 
 tess (then Miss Thomson) with much good 
 humour and sangfroid^ said, " I believe then, 
 the best thing which you can do is to send for 
 your valet, as I am going to have a large party
 
 234 THE TURF. 
 
 here this evening, and shall be most happy 
 to have the pleasure of your company as one 
 of our circle, and as a partner in a waltz." 
 
 Bravo female ingenuity, ready wit, and fe- 
 male decision ! This amiable stratagem had 
 the effect of removing the tenacious old vete- 
 ran : a pretty waltzing partner indeed ! Suf- 
 fice it to say that he beat his unwilling re- 
 treat; and bowed his hoary head. " Adieu !" 
 said the lady to herself, " adieu, pour jamais ! " 
 When a female resolves upon any thing, she 
 is all heart ; prompt, determined, and firm, 
 she accomplishes her end. 
 
 Much of a piece with this manoeuvre (al- 
 though we make no comparison between the 
 chaste Miss Thomson * and the frail eltgante 
 
 in question) was Mrs. C 's coup de main 
 
 with two followers of the law, John Doe and 
 
 * Who has since risen to high rank, and for whom 
 we have great esteem.
 
 THE TURF. 235 
 
 Richard Roe. These troublesome visitors 
 effected an entry into the lady's house, where 
 (not Lord K. but) her military favourite was, 
 and against whom these unwelcome intruders 
 had a writ; a less able female would have 
 started at the approach of these profanes, but 
 she was not thus to be defeated ; and although 
 her ami-de-cceur was in the next room, she 
 very coolly, in answer to " Madam, is the 
 Major * within? " replied " No, but I expect 
 him every minute ; pray be seated. It is," 
 looking at her watch, "within five minutes 
 of his time; he is sure to be here; pray be 
 seated ; you must be tired ; it is a good step 
 fi'om town to our cottage." She then rung 
 the bell, and ordered lunch. " You must,'^ 
 continued she, "be tired; and I presume 
 that you must have some business with the 
 
 * Not Major Strawberry, but a dashing Major oa 
 the town.
 
 236 THE TURF. 
 
 Major/' "Yes, Ma'am, a trifle or so." 
 " Well then you must have some refresh- 
 ment ; you *11 find that cold moor-fowl pretty 
 tolerable, and I cured the ham myself — " (this 
 was a fudge ; she never cured a ham in her 
 life). This is real East India Madeira; 
 the Major sets a high a value on it ; taste it . 
 if you please ; and now you must try my bot- ^ 
 tie, and I will take a glass myself." 
 
 So saying she stepped into the next room, 
 and returned with a case of liqueurs. During 
 her momentary absence she heard the bro- 
 ther-in-law say, " What a prime one ! how 
 affable and good natured ! and how simple ! 
 bless you, she's no old stager, but as gentle as 
 a dove; we must manage this business as 
 genteelly as we can." 
 
 She now entered with the liqueurs, and 
 bumpered them again and again; one mastiff 
 began to feel the power of the liquor, and 
 almost to regret the errand on which he came;
 
 THE TURF. 237 
 
 uneasiness sat on the eye of the other, upon 
 which she took up her liarp and begged of 
 them not to mind her, as she was obhged to 
 practise a new song, as her harp-master would 
 be there that morning ; whereupon the malty 
 brother filled self and partner again, and 
 observed, that he should like to hear her of 
 all things. 
 
 She struck up in delightful style; never 
 was Pluto more enchanted with Orpheus than 
 one of the bailiffs was ; the other had no ear 
 for music, and began to be restless. She tried 
 the liquor again ; but as the inharmonious 
 brother said it was too sweet to drink much 
 of, she proposed as a substitute a glass of 
 brandy and water and a biscuit, which was 
 agreed to ; and whilst they were drinking it, 
 she sang, " Thou art gone away from me, 
 Mary ; " then smiling most fascinatingly, she 
 said, " Gentlemen, you must excuse me ; I 
 have played you a little trick; the Major has
 
 238 THE TURF. 
 
 been gone these two hours, but I hope you 
 are not dissatisfied with your fare. Good 
 morning ! John," (to her footman) " let the 
 gentlemen out." They departed, the one 
 cursing and swearing, the other still asserting 
 that she was a prime article. 
 
 By the way, this same money-loving veteran 
 has passed all his life for a fair and honour- 
 able gambler, if he can be called one who has 
 no objection to fleece a minor, or do such Hke 
 act in the way of business. Lord Dorimont 
 well knew his man, and formed his opinion 
 accordingly; here it will therefore suffice to 
 say, " Leave the Major to a sense of his own 
 wretchedness," and to regret that the young 
 Lord came off with his usual ill-luck, tcarte 
 not favouring him more than the usual losing 
 games at which he played. 
 
 Poor Letterfield is singularly unfortunate : 
 he has a good heart, and is worthy of his 
 descent ; how painful, therefore, it is to his
 
 THE TURF. 239 
 
 friends to see him a prey to the artful and 
 designing, and to know that those who ought 
 only to know him by name talk of his being 
 on his last legs ! That the legs he has known 
 may be the last, we sincerely wish ; and also 
 that he may never need the accommodation 
 of hill-doers of any description; for accom- 
 modation-bills bring the highest names in the 
 land into familiarity and disrespect. 
 
 END OF VOL, I. 
 
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 ginal Text ; but those Words and Ex- 
 pressions are omitted, which cannot 
 with propriety be read aloud in a Fa- 
 mily. 10 vols, royal 18mo. 31. 3s. bds., 
 or in 8 vols. 8vo., the Fifth Edition, 
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 Complete, in 1 vol. 8vo., with Vig- 
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 SELECT W ORKS of the BRI- 
 TISH POETS, from CHAUCER to 
 WITHERS. By Robert Southey, 
 LL. D. Poet Laureate. 1 vol. 8vo., 
 uniform with "Aikin's Poets." — 
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