seven rows are fixed, it does not detract from the legality of the issue.

It is the duty of the official authorities, the stewards included, to see that the course assimilates with the conditions prescribed, and to take care that every facility is afforded to perform the allotted task.

Although the starter has discretionary power to take the horses 100 yards behind the post, there is no law to limit the extension. A steward has started the horses for the Chester Cup one quarterof-a-mile before they arrived at the post. At Goodwood, 1860, the starter, after a dead-heat, took the horses to the five-furlong mark instead of the half-mile. In this instance the second horse, Walloon, would have won if they had run the prescribed course.

There is another state of the law imperfectly understood: for 150 years, horses of a junior age have been allowed to run for public money and plates, for which they are apparently excludedfor instance, Bonny Black, in 1719, won the King's Plate for five-year-old mares at Hambleton, she being four years old; Eclipse, five years, won the King's Plate for six-year olds, at Lewes, 1769; Bedford, three years, won the Hunter's Stakes at Bedford, 1849, carrying four years' weight.

On

this principle, which has never been disputed, a three-year-old can run for a plate for four-years and upwards, or a two-year-old can be entered for a three-year plate; the interpretation signifying they shall not exceed that age. This may be wrong in theory, and not in accordance with the articles of the race, but in practice it is harmless; if publicly known, it does not require revision.

The greatest improvement we have made at Newmarket, is the protection we have afforded to the horses, trainers, and jockeys, by surrounding the weighing-room with open iron palisades, by which means we exclude the idlers, and we avoid the noise and confusion inseparable to mixed society in a small room where silence and good order are essentially necessary to enable the Clerk of the Scales to weigh-out twenty jockeys in a limited period of time. In country race-courses this is a serious evil-the horses unsaddle in the midst of a crowd, where jostling and a transfer of loose weights may be easily made, and the weighing-rooms are crowded with persons who ought to be excluded by the police.

CHAPTER III.

ON THE RULES OF RACING.

IN 1857 the Laws of Racing were revised; the present mode is more concise, and I am at a loss to discover any point on which a dispute can be seriously raised, or where a difference of opinion can exist in their interpretation.

The laws of racing were separated from those of betting, and a formal declaration made by the Jockey Club, Rule 10, that the Jockey Club and the stewards thereof take no cognizance of any disputes or claims with respect to bets. Here I may remark that there is a wide distincțion between the interests of the Turf and the interest of betting.

I allude to the practice of a person starting two horses in a race, and declaring to win with the worst if it suits his book. This is not racing, it is an illegal conventional act to facilitate a gambling transaction; it has not a pleasing influence to see the best horse pulled up, to make way for an

C

inferior companion. In 1840 the Doncaster St. Leger was won by Launcelot, and Maroon was pulled up when he could have won by fifty yards; this is a dangerous modus operandi, not sanctioned by the Jockey Club in 1838. Resolved"That it is the opinion of this Club that it is necessary to declare the extreme disapprobation of horses being started for races without the intention on the part of the owners of trying to win them," although these horses belonged to the same owner there is no rule in the book to countenance this transaction.

Another innovation was introduced in 1847, which was then, and is now, in direct violation with the 6th Rule of Racing, viz. allowing two horses belonging to the same owner to run for a plate by a special clause in the conditions-this system was established to enlarge the field, alias to increase the entrance money; it gave the owners an opportunity of declaring to win with the horse which carried the money, thereby they enjoy the satisfaction of setting the law at defiance; for without this clause both horses would be disqualified, and by the old law, the best horse would be forfeited to the informer.

The chief alterations are the specification of feather-weights, Rule 3, the standard of which in

the olden time was considered to be 4 st., and feathers like catch weights were not called into the scales, until it was discovered in 1841 that Tripoli carried 7 st. 5 lbs. in the Feather Plate last 3 miles B. C.; in 1862 the standard was fixed at 5 st. 7 lbs.

Rule 40 disqualifies a horse from running if he carries less in a public race: this Rule would not affect matches. On circular courses it is a very humane regulation to protect children from the accidents incidental to racing, but at Newmarket it is superfluous legislation.

Rule 4, respecting Maidens, was until lately confined to the United Kingdom; now it extends to every country.

By rule 7, three subscribers constitute a sweepstakes, and if the number be reduced by death the race is considered a sweepstakes as long as two horses are left, the property of different persons; thus in the Juvenile Stakes at York, 1866, by the death of Mr. Osborn, only Mr. Launde's two horses remain, but Mr. L., having sold one of them with his engagements, the sweepstakes stands good.

Rule 9 raises the standard weight to 8 st. 10 lbs., the original St. Leger weight being for colts, 8 st., and the Epsom Derby, 8 st. 2 lbs.