We went then to see the old theatre, where plays used to be performed on great occasions. It was a large circle of stone wall, a miniature of the old amphi-theatre of the Roman Forum, with the sky for a roof. But now a vegetable-garden grows where the spectacle once was seen, and along the walls where the audience sat and gazed deep-hued wallflowers bloom and delicate jasmine-vines hang out their white stars.

Farther on is an old city-gate, which, unfortunately, was to be torn down to make way for a new road. Those gates are veritable pictures, with their beautiful round arches and the niche with its fresco underneath. This porta preserved perfectly in the crimson stone the smooth slide down which the suspended gate slipped at night or in times of danger.

Returning through the piazza, I saw the balcony of a public building draped with red satin, and a flag hung out in it. While this flag was out, Count B—— said, no creature which was sold could be returned to the seller, no matter what flaw might be discovered in it after the bargain was concluded. It was then the time to get rid of women-hating cows and oxen and "made-up" horses.

In the afternoon we went to the church of St. Francis to see the piccola ruota of the Neapolitan peasants, which is apparently a rehearsal for the gran ruota to be performed in the Porziuncola the day following. These people were all gone, when we reached the church, to follow a relic-bearing procession of Franciscans to the little chapel built over the spot where St. Francis was born, and the spectators took advantage of the opportunity to range themselves about the walls and wherever they could find places. We were scarcely in the seats offered us in the choir when a murmur of subdued exclamations, a trampling of many feet and a cloud of dust that filled the vestibule announced the return of the procession. The gates of the iron grating which shut off the chancel and transepts from the nave were opened to admit the monks with their relic, and closed immediately to exclude the crowd. After the short function was ended they were again opened, and the crowd rushed in and began to run around the altar.

These people were all poor: many were old and had to be held up and helped along by a younger person at either side. The women wore handkerchiefs on their heads, and many wore those sandals made of a piece of leather tied up over the foot with strings which give these peasants their popular name of sciusciari, an imitative word derived from the scuffling sound of the sandals in walking. They hurried eagerly on, hustling each other, murmuring prayers and ejaculations, and seemed quite unconscious of the crowd of persons who had come there to stare, perhaps to laugh, at them. The Asisinati looked on without taking any part, and with a curiosity not unmingled with contempt. "The Neapolitans are so material!" they say.

These repeated circlings of the altar, I was told, are intended as so many visits, each time they go round having the value of a visit. Many of these people seek the Pardon not only for themselves, but for friends who are unable to come. The absent confess and communicate at their parish church at home, and unite their intention with that of the person who makes the visit for them.

My padrona di casa told me an anecdote in illustration of this materialism of the Neapolitans, which the Asisinati are anxious not to be thought to share: On the first of August several years before, she said, when the church of St. Francis was full of people waiting around the confessionals, a man at one of them was observed to be disputing with the priest inside. Pressed so closely as they were, many might excuse themselves for being aware that the penitent was refusing to agree to the penance imposed by the priest, who consequently declined to give him absolution. The priest cut the dispute short by closing the wicket and addressing himself to the penitent at the other side. The man left his place and wandered disconsolately about the church, followed by many curious eyes, for not to listen in silent submission to the penance imposed by the priest is a rare scandal. After a while he seemed to have resolved on a compromise, but it was no longer possible to obtain his place in advance of the crowd, where each one waited his turn. He took a post, therefore, directly opposite the front of the confessional, as near as he could get, but with half the width of the nave between, and waited till the priest should be visible. The moment came when the confessor, turning from one penitent to another, was seen from the front. The man leaned eagerly forward, and throwing out his right hand with three fingers extended, as if playing morra, called out, "Quello del casotiello, volete farlo per tre?" ("You in the confessional there, will you do it for three?") (These peasants call the confessional casotiello.) Whether the bargain related to a number of prayers to be said, a number of visits or of masses, does not concern us.

The next afternoon we went down to Santa Maria degli Angeli in the plain, the very penetralia of the Pardon. Those who have visited this church know that the little chapel of the Porziuncola, which is enclosed in its midst like the heart in a body, has two doors—one at the lower end, the other at the upper right corner. It is very dim except when its altar is blazing with candles and its hanging lamps lighted. As we have already said, a visit to this chapel or merely passing through it, for a person who has confessed, satisfies the outward conditions of the Pardon.

In the gran ruota which we were about to witness the Neapolitans entered in an unbroken line at the lower door, passed out without stopping at the upper, ran down the side-aisle of the church and out of the door, in again at the great door, up the nave, and again through the chapel, repeating this over and over for fifteen or twenty minutes. While they make the wheel no one else enters the chapel: all are spectators.

It was for these poor people the supreme moment. They had come from afar at an expense which they could ill afford; they had endured fatigue, perhaps hunger; and they had been mocked at. But, so far, they had accomplished their task. They had confessed their sins with all the fervor and sincerity of which they were capable, had visited the birthplace, the home, the basilica and the distant mountain-retreat of St. Francis, and they had gathered the miraculous yellow fennel-flowers of the mountain. Now they were to receive the Pardon. The chains of hell had fallen from them in confession: at the moment of entering the chapel the bonds of Purgatory would also be loosened, and if they should drop dead there, or die before having committed another sin, they would fly straight to heaven as larks into the morning sky. No passing from a miserable present to a miserable Purgatory, but unimaginable bliss in an instant. Their ideal bliss might not be the highest which the human mind is capable of conceiving, but it was the highest that they could conceive, and their souls strained blindly upward to that point where imagination faints against the thrilling cord with which the body holds the spirit in tether. To these people heaven was not a mere theological expression, a vague place which might or might not be: it was as real as the bay and the sky of Naples and the smoking volcano that nursed for ever their sense of unknown terrors. It was as real as the poppies in their grass and the oranges ripening on their trees. Maria Santissima, in her white robe and the blue mantle where they could count the creases, was there, with ever the vision of a Babe in her arms, and Gesu, the arms of whose cross should fall into folds of a glorious garment about his naked crucified form, in sleeves to his hands, in folds about his feet and raised into a crown about his head. Into this blessed company no earthly pain could enter to destroy their delights. Cold and hunger and the dagger's point could never find them more, nor sickness rack them, nor betrayal set their blood in a poisoned flame, nor earthquakes chill them with terror. Lying in that heavenly sunshine, with fruit-laden boughs within reach and heaps of gold beside them if they should wish for it, they could laugh at Vesuvius licking in vain with its fiery tongue toward them, and at the black clouds heavy with hail that would spread ruin over the fields far away from these celestial vineyards and the waving grain of Paradise.

Exalted by such visions, what to them were the gazing crowd and their own rags and squalor? They entered the Porziuncola singing: they came out at the side-door transfigured, and silent except for some breathless "Maria!" or "Gesu!" Their arms were thrown upward, their glowing black eyes were upraised, their thin swarthy faces burned with a vivid scarlet, their white teeth glittered between the parted lips. Round and round they went like a great water-wheel that revolves in sun and shadow, and the spray it tossed up as it issued from the Porziuncola was rapture, the fiery spray of the soul.

At last all remained outside the chapel, making two long lines from either side the door down the nave to the open air, their faces ever toward the chapel. Then they began to sing in voices as clear and sweet as a chorus of birds. Not a harsh note was there. They sang some hymn that had come down to them from other generations as the robins and the bobo-links drop their songs down to future nestlings, and ever a long-drawn note stretched bright and steady from one stanza to another. So singing, they stepped slowly backward, always gazing steadily at the lighted altar of the Porziuncola, visible through the door, and, stepping backward and singing, they slowly drew themselves out of the church, and the Pardon for them was over.

But though Asisi is not without its notable sights, the chief pleasures there are quiet ones. A walk down through the olive trees to the dry bed of the torrent Tescio will please one who is accustomed to rivers which never leave their beds. One strays among the rocks and pebbles that the rushing waters have brought down from the mountains, and stands dryshod under the arches of the bridges, with something of the feeling excited by visiting a deserted house; with the difference that the Undine people are sure to come rushing down from the mountains again some day. There one searches out charming little nooks which would make the loveliest of pictures. There was one in the Via del Terz' Ordine which was a sweet bit of color. Two rows of stone houses facing on other streets turn their backs to this, and shade it to a soft twilight, till it seems a corridor with a high blue ceiling rather than a street. There it lies forgotten. No one passes through it or looks into it. In one spot the tall houses are separated by a rod or so of high garden-wall with an arch in the middle of it, and under the arch is a door. Over this arch climbs a rose-vine with dropping clusters of tiny pink roses that lean on the stone, hang down into the shadow or lift and melt into the liquid, dazzling blue of the sky. Except the roses and the sky all is a gray shadow. It reminds one of some lovely picture of the Madonna with clustering cherub faces about her head, and you think it would not be discordant with the scene if a miraculous figure should steal into sight under that arch. It is one of the charms of Italy that it can always fitly frame whatever picture your imagination may paint.

One finds a pleasant and cultivated society there too. One of my most highly-esteemed visitors was the canonico priore of the cathedral, whose father had been an officer in the guard of the First Napoleon. A pious and dignified elderly man, this prelate is not too grave to be sometimes amusing as well as instructive. In his youth he had the privilege of being intimate with Cardinal Mezzofanti, who apparently took a fancy to the young Locatelli—"Tommassino" he called him, which is a musical way of saying Tommy. At length he offered to give him lessons in Greek. Full of proud delight at such a privilege, the student went with his books for the first lesson, and was most kindly received.

"Listen, Tommassino!" the cardinal said, turning over the leaves of a great folio. "Here is a magnificent passage of St. Chrysostom's;" and he read it out enthusiastically in fine, sonorous Greek.

"But I do not understand what it means," said the pupil.

"To be sure;" and the savant at once translated the passage into musical Italian, and pointed out its beauties of thought and expression. And so on, passage after passage, but never a word of grammar.

Another time it was another of the Fathers or a heathen poet or a chapter from the Bible read, translated and commented upon; but never from first to last did Tommassino learn to conjugate a verb or form a sentence from his learned professor.

"Mezzofanti," the prior said, "was as good as he was learned. He lived simply, would not have been known from a common priest by his dress in the street, and visited the sick like a parish priest."

Just at the foot of the hill on which Asisi is built a farm-school was established a few years ago, the first director being the Benedictine abate Lisi, a nobleman by birth and a farmer-monk by choice. His death a year or two ago was deeply regretted. To this establishment boys are sent, instead of to prison, after their first conviction for an offence against the law. We saw this school on a former visit to Asisi, and were much amused to see the tall, raw-boned abate stride about in his long black robe, which some of his motions threatened to rend from top to bottom. Clergymen habituated to the wearing of the long robe acquire, little by little, a restrained step and carriage, somewhat like a woman's, so that in ordinary masculine dress they may be discovered by their walk: one would say that they walk like women dressed in men's garments. The free stride in a narrow petticoat is almost comical.

On this occasion we had a new exemplification of the almost incredible riches of Italy, for the abate Lisi's house was crowded with objects dug up in digging cellars and drains and in cultivating the farm, though there had been no intention to excavate and the owner was rather embarrassed than otherwise by the riches he had acquired. Ancient coins of many different nations, fragments of exquisite architectural carving, statuary and household utensils, loaded shelves, tables and drawers. Italy would seem to be wrought of such like a coral-reef, down to its very foundations in the deep.

The abate had no utopian ideas concerning his work, though he heartily devoted his life to it. "These boys," he said, "will go out contadini—still thieves, if you will—but they will limit themselves to stealing a third out of their master's portion of the produce."

In Asisi we learned to understand what we may call atmospheric politics, and it confirmed our former opinion that the Italian people do not care a fig who governs them if only they are well fed. When they are hungry they rebel, and the only freedom they covet is freedom from the pangs of hunger. They are equally well pleased with the pope or with "Vittorio," as they called him, if their simple meal is always within reach; and if on feast-days they can have a chicken, red wine instead of white, and a dolce, their contentment rises to enthusiasm.

A drought or a destructive rain is therefore to be feared by any government, especially if there be malcontents to make use of it. There was quite a severe drought in Asisi last summer, and loud and deep were the imprecations we heard against the government. As the vines withered and the corn shrank, so withered and shrank the king and his ministers in the esteem of these poor people. Count Bindangoli told me that they very much feared some democratic demonstration, and that they were anxiously looking forward to the winter. In vain for weeks we looked over to Perugia for rain (rain comes to Asisi only from that direction). In vain were prayers in the churches, processions and promises. We saw the gray showers sail around the horizon, heard their far-off thunders, saw the lightning zigzag down through the slanting torrents, and almost saw the hills grow green under them. The only tempests we had were those we saw brooding on the brows of scowling contadini. They talked openly of a republic, they were sick of the devouring taxes, they regretted the papacy: there was certainly danger of some "scompiglio," my padrone di casa assured me.

At length, after long weeks of waiting, Perugia disappeared in a gray deluge: the rain came marching like an army across the plain toward us; its first scattered drops printed the dust, its sheets of water drenched the windows, its small torrents rushed down the steep streets. The mountains grew dim and almost disappeared: we were shut in with hope and a fresh delight. Then the deluge settled into a gentle rain, under which the grapes swelled out their globes, the corn rustled with a fuller growth and the hearts of men grew content. The king and his ministers also budded out into new beauty, and flourished in popular esteem like the green bay tree, and the republic was quenched—till the next drought.

The Author of "Signor Monaldini's Niece."



HORSE-RACING IN FRANCE,

TWO PAPERS.—I.



The passion for horse-racing, which for more than two centuries has made the sport a national one in England, cannot be said to exist in France, and the introduction of this "pastime of princes" into the latter country has been of comparatively recent date. Mention, it is true, has been found of races on the plain of Les Sablons as early as 1776, and in the next year a sweepstakes of forty horses, followed by one of as many asses, was run at Fontainebleau in the presence of the court. But it is not until 1783 that one meets with the semblance of an organization, and this as a mere caprice of certain grandees, who affected an English style in everything, and who thought to introduce the customs of the English turf along with the chapeau Anglais and the riding-coat. It was notably the comte d'Artois (afterward Charles X.), the duc de Chartres (Philippe Egalite), the marquis de Conflans and the prince de Guemenee who fancied themselves obliged, in their character of Anglomaniacs, to patronize the race-course; but the public of that time, to whom this imitation of English manners was not only an absurdity, but almost a treason against the state, gave but a cold reception to the attempted innovation. Racing, too, from its very nature, found itself in direct conflict with all the traditions of the ancient school of equitation, and it encountered from the beginning the severe censure and opposition of horsemen accustomed to the measured paces of the manege, whose highest art consisted in consuming a whole hour in achieving at a gallop the length of the terrace of St. Germain. The professors of this equestrian minuet, as solemn and formal in the saddle as was the dancer Dupre in the ballets of the period, predicted the speedy decay of the old system of horsemanship and the extinction of the native breed of horses if France should allow her soil to be invaded by foreign thoroughbreds with their English jockeys and trainers. The first French sportsmen—to use the word in its limited sense—thus found themselves not only unsupported by public opinion, but alone in the midst of an actively-hostile community, and no one can say how the unequal contest might have ended had not the graver events of the Revolution intervened to put an end, for a time at least, not only to the luxurious pleasures, but to all the hopes and ambitions, of the noble class of idlers.

The wars with England that followed retarded for a quarter of a century the introduction of racing into France. The first ministerial ordinance in which the words pur sang occur is that of the 3d of March, 1833, signed by Louis Philippe and countersigned by Adolphe Thiers, establishing a register of the thoroughbreds existing in France—in other words, a national stud-book, by which name it is universally known. The following year witnessed the foundation of the celebrated Society for the Encouragement of the Improvement of Breeds of French Horses, more easily recognized under the familiar title of the "Jockey Club." The first report of this society exposed the deplorable condition of all the races of horses in the country, exhausted as they had been by the frightful draughts made upon them in the imperial wars, and concluded by urging the necessity of the creation of a pure native stock, of which the best individuals, to be selected by trial of their qualities of speed and endurance upon the track, should be devoted to reproduction. This was the doctrine which had been practically applied in England, and which had there produced in less than a century the most important and valuable results. France had but to follow the example of her neighbor, and, borrowing from the English stock of thoroughbreds, to establish a regular system of races as the means of developing and improving the breed of horses upon her own soil.

This reasoning seemed logical enough, but the administration of the Haras, or breeding-stables—which is in France a branch of the civil service—opposed this innovation, and contended that the only pure type of horse was the primitive Arab, and that every departure from this resulted in the production of an animal more or less degenerate and debased. The reply of the Jockey Club was, that the English thoroughbred is, in fact, nothing else than a pure Arab, modified only by the influences of climate and treatment, and that it would be much wiser and easier to profit by a result already obtained than to undertake to retrace, with all its difficulties and delays, the same road that England had taken a century to travel.

The experience gained since 1833 has shown that the conclusions of the Jockey Club were right, but the evidence of facts and of the results obtained has not yet brought the discussion to a close. The administration of the Haras still keeps up its opposition to the raising of thoroughbreds, and will no doubt continue to do so for some time to come, so tenacious is the hold of routine—or, as the Englishman might say, of red tape—upon the official mind in France, whether the question be one of finance, of war or of the breeding of horses.

But it is not only against the ill-will of the administration that the Jockey Club has had to struggle during all these years: it has had also to contend with the still more disheartening indifference of the public in the matter of racing. There is no disputing the fact that the genuine lover of the horse, the homme de cheval—or, if I may be forgiven a bit of slang for the sake of its expressiveness, the horsey man, whether he be coachman or groom, jockey or trainer—is not in France a genuine product of the soil, as he seems to be in England. Look at the difference between the cabman of London and his brother of Paris, if there be enough affinity between them to justify this term of relationship. The one drives his horse, the other seems to be driven by his. In London the driver of an omnibus has the air of a gentleman managing a four-in-hand: in Paris the imbecile who holds the reins looks like a workman who has been hired by the day to do a job that he doesn't understand. So pronounced is this antipathy—for it is more than indifference—of the genuine man of the people toward all things pertaining to the horse that, notwithstanding all the encouragements that for nearly half a century have been lavishly offered for the purpose of developing a public taste in this direction, not a single jockey or trainer who can properly be called a Frenchman has thus far made his appearance. All the men and boys employed in the racing-stables are of English origin, though many, perhaps most, of them have been born in France; but the purity of their English blood, so important in their profession, is as jealously preserved by consanguineous marriages as is that of the noble animals in their charge. It was an absolute necessity for the early turfmen of France to import the Anglo-Saxon man with the Anglo-Arabian horse if they would bring to a creditable conclusion the programme of 1833. And during all the long period that has since elapsed what courage and patience, what determined will, to say nothing of the prodigious expenditure of money, have been shown by the founders of the race-course in France and by their successors! Their perseverance has had its reward, indeed, in the brilliancy of the results obtained, but there is still due to them an ampler tribute of recognition than they have yet received, and it will be a grateful duty to dwell for a while upon the history of the Jockey Club.

Of its fourteen original members but two survive, the duc de Nemours and M. Ernest Leroy. The other twelve were His Royal Highness the duc d'Orleans, M. Rieussec, who was killed by the infernal machine of Fieschi, the comte de Cambis, equerry to the duc d'Orleans, Count Demidoff, Fasquel, the chevalier de Machado, the prince de la Moskowa, M. de Normandie, Lord Henry Seymour, Achille Delamarre, Charles Lafitte and Caccia. To these fourteen gentlemen were soon added others of the highest rank or of the first position in the aristocratic world of Paris. People began to talk with bated breath of the Jockey Club and of its doings, and strange stories were whispered of the habits of some of its distinguished members. The eccentricities of Count Demidoff and of Major Frazer, the obstreperous fooleries of Lord Henry Seymour, the studied extravagances of Comte d'Alton-Shee, created in the public mind the impression that the club was nothing less than a sort of infernal pit, peopled by wicked dandies like Balzac's De Marsay, Maxime de Trailles, Rastignac, etc. Even the box of the club at the opera was dubbed with the uncanny nickname loge infernale, and the talk of the town ran upon the frightful sums lost and won every night at the tables of the exclusive cercle, while the nocturnal passer-by pointed with a shudder to the windows of the first floor at the corner of the Rue de Grammont and the Boulevard, glimmering until morning dawn with a light altogether satanic. The truth must be confessed that jeunesse doree of the period affected a style somewhat "loud." There was exaggeration in everything—in literature—for it was the epoch of the great romantic impulse—in art, in politics: what wonder, then, that the distractions of high life should over-pass the boundaries of good taste, and even of propriety? The Jockey Club in the time of Louis Philippe did but recall the good old days of Brookes's and of White's, of the two Foxes, of George Selwyn and of Sheridan. But how changed is all this! There is not to-day in Paris, perhaps in the world, a more sedate, reputable and in every sense temperate club than the "Jockey." It concerns itself only with racing, the legitimate object of its foundation, and nothing else is discussed in its salons, if we except one room, which under the Empire was baptized "The Camp of Chalons," for the reason that it had come to be reserved for the use of the old soldiers, who met there to talk over incidents of army life. Baccarat, that scourge of Parisian clubs, is forbidden, and lovers of play are obliged to content themselves with a harmless rubber of whist. As one black ball in six is sufficient to exclude a candidate—or, to use the official euphemism, to cause his "postponement"—it is not difficult for the coterie that controls the club to keep it clear of all noisy, or even of merely too conspicuous, individuality. Lord Henry Seymour would be "pilled" to-day by a probably unanimous vote. A candidate may enjoy all the advantages of wealth and position, he may have the entree to all the salons, and may even be a member of clubs as exclusive as the Union and the Pommes-de-Terre, and yet he may find himself unable to gain admission to the Jockey. Any excess of notoriety, any marked personal eccentricity, would surely place him under the ban. Scions of ancient families, who have had the wisdom to spend in the country and with their parents the three or four years succeeding their college life, would have a much better chance of admission than a leader of fashion such as I have described. The illustrious General de Charette; M. Soubeyran, at that time governor of the Credit foncier of France; the young Henry Say, brother-in-law of the prince A. de Broglie, rich and accomplished, and the owner, moreover, of a fine racing-stable; together with many other gentlemen whose private lives were above suspicion,—have been blackballed for the simple reason that they were too widely known. As to foreigners, let them avoid the mortification of certain defeat by abstaining from offering themselves, unless indeed they should happen to be the possessors of a great historic name or should occupy in their own country a position out of the reach of ordinary mortals. This careful exclusion of all originality and diversity has, by degrees, communicated to the club a complexion somewhat negative and colorless, but at the same time, it must be admitted, of the most perfect distinction. The most influential members, although generally very wealthy, live in Paris with but few of the external signs of luxury, and devote their incomes to home comforts and to the improvement of their estates. If one should happen to meet on the Champs Elysees a mail-coach or a daumont [an open carriage, the French name of which has been adopted by the English, like landau, etc. It is drawn by two horses driven abreast, and each mounted by a postilion. The nearest English equivalent is a "victoria."] that makes the promenaders turn and look back, or if there be an avant-scene at the Varietes or the Palais Royal that serves as a point of attraction for all the lorgnettes of the theatre, one may be quite sure that the owners of these brilliant turnouts and the occupants of this envied box are not members of the club—"the Club," par excellence, for thus is it spoken of in Paris. It is considered quite correct at the club to devote one's self to the raising of cattle and sheep, as the comtes de Bouville, de Behague, de Hauteserre and others have done with such success, and one may even follow the example of the comte de Falloux, the eloquent Academician, in emblazoning with one's arms a pen of fat pigs at a competitive show, without in the least derogating from one's dignity. One may also sell the wine from one's vineyards and the iron from one's furnaces—for the iron industry is in France looked upon as a sort of heritage of the nobility—but to get money by any other means than those I have indicated would be considered in the worst possible taste. On the other hand, it is permitted to any member of the club to lose as much money as he pleases without loss of the respect of his fellows, and the surest way to arrive at this result is to undertake the breeding and running of horses.

As to the external appearance and bearing of the perfect clubman, it is very much that of Disraeli's hero, "who could hardly be called a dandy or a beau. There was nothing in his dress, though some mysterious arrangement in his costume—some rare simplicity, some curious happiness—always made him distinguished: there was nothing, however, in his dress, which could account for the influence that he exercised over the manners of his contemporaries;" and it is probably a fact that a member of the club is never noticed by passers on the street on account of anything in his dress or appearance. In short, the club seems to have adopted for its motto Sancta simplicitas, and the descendants of the old nobility of France, excluded as they practically are to-day from all public employment save that of the army, seem determined to live amongst themselves, in tranquillity and retirement, in such a way as to attract the least possible notice from the press or from the crowd. Their portraits never find their way into the illustrated papers, and no penny-a-liner ventures to make them the subject of a biographical sketch: indeed, any one rash enough to seek to tread upon this forbidden ground would find himself met at the threshold by a dignified but very decided refusal of all information and material necessary to his undertaking.

As an illustration of the care taken by the ruling spirits of the club to preserve the attitude which they have assumed toward the public, it may be worth mentioning that Isabelle, who for a long time enjoyed the distinction of serving the club as its accredited flower-girl, and who in that capacity used to hold herself in readiness every evening in her velvet tub at the foot of the staircase of the splendid apartments at the corner of the Boulevard and the Rue Scribe—the present location of the club—was dismissed for no other reason than that she had become too extensively known to the gay world of Paris. Excluded from the sacred paddock on the race-course, she is to-day compelled to content herself on great occasions with selling her flowers on the public turf from a pretty basket-wagon drawn by a pair of coquettish black ponies, or "toy" ponies in the language of the day.

Notwithstanding the magnificence of the present quarters of the club to which I have referred, one cannot help regretting that, unlike the Agricultural Society and the Club of the Champs Elyses, it is obliged to confine itself to one story of the building—the first floor, according to continental enumeration—though the rental of this floor alone amounts to some three hundred thousand francs a year.

The committee on races, composed of fifteen members (founders) and fifteen associate members—the latter elected every year by the founders—represents the club in all that concerns its finances and property, votes the budget, the programme of all races and the conditions of the prizes, and not only legislates in making the laws that govern the course, but acts also as judge in deciding questions that may arise under the code that it has established. And as a legislative body it has its hands almost as full as that of the state, for the budget of the society grows from year to year as rapidly as the nation's, and there are now forty-nine turfs for which it is responsible or to which it has extended its protection. The presidency of the committee, after having been held for many years by the lamented Vicomte Daru, passed on his death last year to M. Auguste Lupin, the oldest proprietor of race-horses in France. To M. Lupin, moreover, belongs the honor of being the first breeder in France who has beaten the English in their own country by gaining the Goodwood Cup in 1855 with Jouvence—success that was renewed by his horse Dollar in 1864. M. Lupin, who had six times won the Jockey Club Purse (the French Derby) and twice the Grand Prix de Paris, occupies very much the same position in France that Lord Falmouth holds in England, and, like him, he never bets. His colors, black jacket and red cap, are exceedingly popular, and received even more than their wonted share of applause in the year 1875, the most brilliant season in the history of his stables, when he carried off all the best prizes with St. Cyr, Salvator and Almanza. His stud, which has numbered amongst its stallions the Baron, Dollar and the Flying Dutchman, is at Vaucresson, near Versailles. His training-stables are at La Croix, St. Ouen.

Of the remaining members of the committee on races, the best known are the prince de la Moskowa, the comte A. de Noailles, Henry Delamarre, Comte Frederic de Lagrange, Comte A. des Cars, J. Mackenzie-Grieves, Comte H. de Turtot, the duc de Fitz-James, Baron Shickler, the prince A. d'Aremberg, Prince Joachim Murat, Comte Roederer, the marquis de Lauriston, Baron Gustave de Rothschild, E. Fould and the comtes de St. Sauveur, de Kergorlay and de Juigne. Most of these gentlemen run their horses, or have done so, and the list will be found to comprise, with two or three exceptions, the principal turfmen of France. The comte de Juigne and the prince d'Aremberg, both very rich, and much liked in Paris, have formed a partnership in turf matters, and the colors they have adopted, yellow and red stripes for the jacket, with black cap, are always warmly welcomed. In 1873, with Montargis, they won the Cambridgeshire Stakes, which were last year carried off by the American horse Parole, and in 1877 they renewed the exploit with Jongleur. The count, on this latter occasion, had taken no pains to conceal the merits of his horse, but, on the contrary, had spoken openly of what he believed to be his chances, and had even advised the betting public to risk their money upon him. As the English were giving forty to one against him, the consequence of M. de Juigne's friendly counsel was that the morning after the race saw a perfect shower of gold descending upon Paris, the English guineas falling even into the white caps held out with eager hands by the scullions of the cafes that line the Boulevard. One well-known restaurateur, Catelain, of the Restaurant Helder on the Boulevard des Italiens, pocketed a million of francs, and testified his satisfaction, if not his gratitude, by forthwith baptizing a new dish with the name of the winning horse. The comte de Juigne himself cleared three millions, and many members of the club were made the richer by sums ranging from one hundred to one hundred and fifty thousand francs. The marquis de Castellane, an habitual gambler, who happened to have put only a couple of hundred louis on the horse, could not hide his chagrin that his venture had returned him but a hundred and sixty thousand francs. Jongleur won the French Derby (one hundred and three thousand francs) in 1877, besides thirteen other important races. He was unfortunately killed while galloping in his paddock in September, 1878.

The Scotch jacket and white cap of the duc de Fitz-James, owner of the fine La Sorie stud, and the same colors, worn by the jockeys of the duc de Fezenzac, have won but few of the prizes of the turf, and another nobleman, the comte de Berteux (green jacket, red cap) is noted for the incredible persistency of his bad luck. M. Edouard Fould, whose mount is known by the jackets hooped with yellow and black and caps of the latter color, is the proprietor of the well-known D'Ibos stud at the foot of the Pyrenees, one of the largest and best-ordered establishments of the kind in France; and it is to him and to his uncle, the late Achille Fould, that the South owes in a great degree the breeding and development of the thoroughbred horse. M. Delatre (green jacket and cap) raises every year, at La Celle St. Cloud, some twenty yearlings, of which he keeps but three or four, selling the rest at Tattersall's, Rue Beaujon, to the highest bidder. They generally bring about six thousand francs a head, on an average.

The feeling against Germany after the war led to a proposition to expel from the club all members belonging to that country; and it was only the liking and sympathy felt for one of them, Baron Schickler, a very wealthy lover of the turf and for a long time resident in France, which caused a rejection of the motion. Baron Schickler, however, has nominally retired from the turf since 1870, and his horses are now run under the pseudonyme of Davis. His colors are white for the jacket, with red sleeves and cherry cap. Another member, Mr. A. de Montgomery, the excellent Norman breeder and the fortunate owner of La Toucques and of Fervaques, has also given up racing under his own name, and devotes himself exclusively to the oversight of the Rothschild stables. The good-fortune which the mere possession of this distinguished name would seem sufficient to ensure has not followed the colors of Baron Gustave de Rothschild in the racing field, where his blue jackets and yellow caps have not been the first to reach the winning-post in the contests for the most important prizes. He buys, nevertheless, the best mares and the finest stallions, and he has to-day, in his excellent stud at Meautry, the illustrious Boiard, who had won, before he came into the baron's possession, the Ascot Cup of 1873 and the Grand Prix de Paris. The Rothschild training-stables are at Chantilly. Boiard, as well as Vermont, another of the grandest horses ever foaled in France, and a winner also of the Grand Prix de Paris, was formerly in possession of M. Henry Delamarre, who in the days of the Empire enjoyed a short period of most remarkable success, having won the French Derby no less than three times within four years. His choice of colors was a maroon jacket with red sleeves and black cap. He had some lesser triumphs last year, at the autumn meeting in the Bois de Boulogne, where his mare Reine Claude won the Prix du Moulin by two lengths, his horse Vicomte, who up to that time had been running so badly, taking the Prix d'Automne, while the second prize of the same name was carried off by Clelie, thus gaining for the Delamarre stables three races out of the five contested on that day. All M. Delamarre's horses come from the Bois-Roussel stud, belonging to Comte Roederer.

There remain to be mentioned, amongst the number of gentlemen who are in the habit of entering their horses for races in France, a Belgian, the comte de Meeues, one of whose horses was the favorite in the race last mentioned, and though beaten, as often happens with favorites, he and other animals from the same stables have this year carried away several of the provincial prizes; M.L. Andre, owner of this season's winners of the steeple-chase handicap known as the Prix de Pontoise and of several hurdle-races; M.A. de Borda, who was unsuccessful in the present year in three at least of the races in which he had entered; M.E. de la Charme, who in June, 1879, took the Grand Prix du Conseil-General (handicap) at Lyons, and in September won at Vincennes the hurdle-race Prix de Charenton; the marquis de Caumont-Laforce, whose colors were first this summer at Moulins in the Prix du Conseil-General, and in the third Criterium at Fontainebleau, as well as in the grand handicap at Beauvais last July; M.P. Aumont, who has been not without some good luck in the provinces during the past season; M. Moreau-Chaslon, whose successes of late have hardly been in proportion to his numerous entries, though he won the last Prix des Villas at Vesinet, the Prix du Jockey Club (three thousand francs) at Chalons-sur-Saone and the Prix du Mont-Valerien at the Bois de Boulogne; and, to bring to an end our long list of devotees of the turf, we add the name of M. Ephrussi, who, amongst the numerous races in which he has entered horses in 1879, has been victorious in not a few—for instance, in the steeple-chase handicap at La Marche, called the Prix de Clairefontaine, in L'Express at Fontainebleau, in the Prix de Neuilly at the Bois de Boulogne, and in the handicap for the Prix des Ecuries at Chantilly, as well as in a race for gentlemen riders only at Maison-Lafitte. Besides these and others, he gained last August the Jockey Club Prize (five thousand francs) at Chalons-sur-Saone, the Prix de Louray at Deauville for the like amount, another of the same figures at Vichy, and the six thousand francs of the Grand Prix du Havre. Most of the gentlemen last named are the owners of a comparatively small number of horses, which are, perhaps without exception, entrusted to the care of the famous trainer Henry Jennings of La Croix, St. Ouen, near Compiegne.

Henry Jennings is a character. His low, broad-brimmed beaver—which has gained him the sobriquet of "Old Hat"—pulled well down over a square-built head, the old-fashioned high cravat in which his neck is buried to the ears, the big shoes ensconced in clumsy gaiters, give him more the air of a Yorkshire gentleman-farmer of the old school than of a man whose home since his earliest youth has been in France. He is one of the most original figures in the motley scene as he goes his rounds in the paddock, mysterious and knowing, very sparing of his words, and responding only in monosyllables even to the questions of his patrons, while he whispers in the ears of his jockeys the final instructions which many an interested spectator would give something to hear. Beginning his career in the service of the prince de Beauvan, from which he passed first to that of the duc de Morny and afterward to that of the comte de Lagrange, he is now a public trainer upon his own account, with more than a hundred horses under his care. No one has devoted more intelligent study to the education of the racer or shown a more intuitive knowledge of his nature and of his needs. It was he who first threw off the shackles of ancient custom by which a horse during the period of training was kept in such an unnatural condition, by means of drugs and sweatings, that at the end of his term of probation he was a pitiful object to behold. The pictures and engravings of twenty years ago bear witness to the degree of "wasting" to which a horse was reduced on the eve of a race, and the caricatures of the period are hardly over-drawn when they exhibit to us the ghost of an animal mounted by a phantom jockey. When people saw that Jennings was able to bring to the winning-post horses in good condition, whose training had been based upon nothing but regular work, they at first looked on in astonishment, but afterward found their profit in imitating his example. Under this rational system it has been proved that the animal gains in power and endurance while he loses nothing in speed. The same intrepid trainer has ventured upon another innovation. Impressed with the inconveniences of shoeing, and annoyed by the difficulty of finding a skilful smith in moving from one place to another in the country, he conceived the idea of letting his horses go shoeless, both during training and on the track; and, despite all that could be urged against the practice his horses' feet are in excellent condition. His many successes on the turf have not, however, been crowned, as yet, by the Grand Prix de Paris, though in 1877 he thought to realize the dream of his ambition with Jongleur, whom he had trained and whom he loved like a son; and when the noble horse was beaten by an outsider, St Christopher, "Old Hat" could not control an exhibition of ill-humor as amusing as it was touching. When Jongleur died Jennings wept for perhaps the first time in his life, and he was still unable to restrain his tears when he described the tortures of the poor beast as he struck his head against the sides of his box in the agonies of lockjaw.

Let us close our list—in which, however, we have endeavored to enumerate only the principal figures upon the French turf—with two names; and first that of the young Edmond Blanc, heir to the immense fortune gained by his late father as director of the famous gaming-tables of Monaco. The latter, like a prudent parent, forbade his son to race or to play, and Edmond, obeying the letter of the law—at least during the lifetime of his father—was known, if known at all upon the course, under the pseudonyme of James. At present, however, he is the owner of an important stud and stable which are constantly increasing, and which bid fair before long to take rank amongst the principal establishments in the country. Waggish tongues have whispered that when he had to make choice of colors he naturally inclined to "rouge et noir," but finding these already appropriated by M. Lupin, the representative of "trente et quarante" was forced to content himself with tints more brilliant perhaps, but less suggestive. But let him laugh who wins. The annals of the turf for 1879 inscribe the name of M. Blanc as winner of the Grand Prix de Paris. It was his mare, Nubienne, who first reached the winning-post by a neck in a field of eleven horses, M. Fould's Salteador being second, with barely a head between him and the third, Flavio II., belonging to the comte Frederic de Lagrange.

This latter proprietor, the most celebrated of all—in the sense of being the most widely known and the most talked about—I have reserved for the end of my catalogue. Comte de Lagrange made his debut upon the turf in the year 1857, now more than twenty years ago, by buying outright the great stable of M. Alexander Aumont, which boasted at that time amongst its distinguished ornaments the famous Monarque, who had, before passing into the hands of his new owner, gained eight races in eight run, and who, under the colors of the comte, almost repeated the feat by winning eight in nine; and of these two were the Goodwood Cup and the Newmarket Handicap. Afterward, at the Dangu stud, he achieved a fame of another sort, but in the eyes of horsemen perhaps still more important. Never has sire transmitted to his colts his own best qualities with such certainty and regularity. Hospodar, Le Mandarin, Trocadero were amongst his invaluable gifts to the comte, but his crowning glory is the paternity of the illustrious Gladiateur, the Eclipse of modern times. Gladiateur, said the baron d'Etreilly, recalls Monarque as one hundred recalls ten. There were the very same lines, the same length of clean muscular neck well set on the same deep and grandly-placed shoulders, the same arching of the loins, the same contour of hips and quarters, but all in proportions so colossal that every one who saw him, no matter how indifferent to horseflesh in general, remained transfixed in admiration of a living machine of such gigantic power.

The first appearance of Gladiateur upon the race-course was at the Newmarket autumn meeting of 1864, where he won the Clearwell Stakes, beating a field of twelve horses. He was kept sufficiently "shady," however, during the winter to enable his owner to make some advantageous bets upon him, though it required careful management to conceal his extraordinary powers. His training remains a legend in the annals of the stables of Royal-Lieu, where the jockeys will tell you how he completely knocked all the other horses out of time, and how two or three of the very best put in relay to wait upon him were not enough to cover the distance. Fille-de-l'Air herself had to be sacrificed, and it was in one of these terrible gallops that she finished her career as a runner. Mandarin alone stood out, but even he, they say, showed such mortal terror of the trial that when he was led out to accompany his redoubtable brother he trembled from head to foot, bathed in sweat. In 1865, Gladiateur gained the two thousand guineas and the Derby at Epsom, and for the first time the blue ribbon was borne away from the English. "When Gladiateur runs," said the English papers at this time, "the other horses hardly seem to move." The next month he ran for the Grand Prix de Paris. His jockey, Harry Grimshaw, had the coquetry to keep him in the rear of the field almost to the end, as if he were taking a gallop for exercise, and when Vertugadin reached the last turn the favorite, some eight lengths behind, seemed to have forgotten that he was in the race at all. The public had made up its mind that it had been cheated, when all at once the great horse, coming up with a rush, passed all his rivals at a bound, to resume at their head his former easy and tranquil pace. There had not been even a contest: Gladiateur had merely put himself on his legs, and all had been said. These three victories brought in to Comte de Lagrange the sum of four hundred and forty-one thousand seven hundred and twenty-five francs, to say nothing of the bets. Gladiateur afterward won the race of six thousand metres (two miles fourteen furlongs) which now bears his name, and also the Great St. Leger at Doncaster. He was beaten but once—in the Cambridgeshire, where he was weighted at a positively absurd figure, and when, moreover, the track was excessively heavy. After his retirement from the turf he was sold in 1871 for breeding purposes in England for two hundred thousand francs, and died in 1876.

Like M. Fould and several other brethren of the turf, Comte de Lagrange felt the discouragements of the Franco-German war, and sold all his horses to M. Lefevre. Fortunately, however, he had retained in his stud at Dangu a splendid lot of breeding-mares, and with these he has since been able to reconstruct a stable of the first order, though the effort has cost him a very considerable sum. Indeed, he himself admits that to cover expenses he would have to make as much as thirty thousand pounds every year. Four times victorious in the French Derby before 1870, he has since repeated this success for two successive years—in 1878 with Insulaire, and in 1879 with Zut. His colors (blue jacket with red sleeves and a red cap) are as well known in England as in his own country. Within the last six years he has three times won the Oaks at Epsom with Regalia, Reine and Camelia, the Goodwood Cup with Flageolet, the two thousand guineas and the Middlepark and Dewhurst Plates with Chamant. On the 12th of June, last year, at Ascot, he gained two races out of three, and in the third one of his horses came in second.

But the count is by no means always a winner, nor does he always win with the horse that, by all signs, ought to be the victor. He has somehow acquired, whether justly or not, the reputation of being a "knowing hand" upon the turf, and all turfmen will understand what is implied in the term, whether of good or of evil. His stable has been called a "surprise-box," which simply means that the "horse carrying the first colors does not always carry the money;" that people who think they know the merits of his horses frequently lose a good deal by the unexpected turn of affairs upon the track; and that the count, in short, manages to take care of himself in exercising the undoubted right of an owner, as by rule established, to win if he can with any one of the horses that he may have running together for any given event. Nothing dishonorable, according to the laws of the turf, has ever been proved, nor perhaps even been charged, against him; but as one of his countrymen, from whom I have just now quoted, remarks, "He is fond of showing to demonstration that a man does not keep two hundred horses in training just to amuse the gallery."

These repeated triumphs, as well as the not less frequent ones of MM. Lefevre, Lupin and de Juigne, have naturally set the English a-thinking. They have to admit that the time has passed when their handicappers could contemptuously give a French horse weights in his favor, and a party headed by Lords Falmouth, Hardwicke and Vivian and Sir John Astley of the London Jockey Club has been formed with the object of bringing about some modifications of the international code.

A war of words has ensued between Admiral Rous and Viscount Daru, the respective presidents of the two societies, in the course of which the admiral has urged that as English horses are admitted to only two races in France, the Grand Prix de Paris and the Deauville Cup, while French horses are at liberty to enter upon any course in England, it is quite time that a reciprocity of privileges were recognized, and that racers be put upon an equal footing in the two countries. Not at all, replies M. Daru; and for this reason: there are three times as many race-horses in England as in France, and the small number of the latter would bring down the value of the French prizes to next to nothing if the stakes are based, as they are in England, upon the sum-total of the entries. In France the government, the encouragement societies, the towns, the railway companies, all have to help to make up the purses, and often with very considerable sums. Would it be fair to let in English horses in the proportion of, say, three to one—supposing the value of the horses to be equal—to carry off two-thirds of these subscriptions? To this the Englishman answers, not without a show of reason, that if the foreign horses should come into France in any great numbers this very circumstance would make the entrance-moneys a sufficient remuneration to the winner, and that the government, the Jockey Club and the rest would be relieved from a continuance of their subventions. The discussion is still kept up, and it is not unlikely that the successors of MM. Rous and Daru will keep on exchanging notes for some years without coming nearer to a solution than the diplomats have come to a settlement of the Eastern Question.

I have said that the Jockey Club of Paris grants subventions to the racing societies of the provinces, which it takes under its patronage to the number of about forty-five, but it undertakes the actual direction of the races at only three places—namely, Chantilly, Fontainebleau and Deauville-sur-Mer—besides those of Paris. Up to 1856, the Paris races were run on the Champ de Mars, where the track was too hard and the turns were very sharp and awkward. In the last-mentioned year the city ceded to the Societe d'Encouragement the open field at Longchamps, lying between the western limit of the Bois de Boulogne and the river Seine. The ground measures about sixty-six hectares in superficial area, and this ample space has permitted the laying out of several tracks of different lengths and of varying form, and has avoided any necessity for sharp turns. The whole race-course is well sodded, and the ground is as good as artificially-made ground can be. It is kept up and improved by yearly outlays, and these very considerable expenses are confided to Mr. J. Mackenzie-Grieves, so well known for his horsemanship to all the promenaders of the Bois.

The race-course at Longchamps enjoys advantages of situation and surroundings superior, beyond all question, to those of any other in the world. The approaches to it from Paris are by an uninterrupted succession of the most charming drives—the Champs Elysees, the grand avenue of the Bois de Boulogne, and finally through the lovely shaded alleys of the Bois. Arrived at the Cascade, made famous by the attempt of Berezowski upon the life of the czar in 1867, the eye takes in at a glance the whole of the vast space devoted to the race-course, overlooked to the right by a picturesque windmill and an ancient ivy-mantled tower, and at the farther extremity by the stands for spectators. To the left the view stretches over the rich undulating hills of S[e]vres and of Meudon, strewn with pretty villas and towers and steeples, and rests in the dim distance upon the blue horizon of Les Verrieres.

The elegant central stand or tribune, of brick and stone, is reserved for the chief of the state. In the time of the last presidency it was almost always occupied by the marshal, a great lover of horses, and by his little court; but his successor, M. Grevy, whose sporting propensities are satisfied by a game of billiards or a day's shooting with his pointers, generally waives his privilege in favor of the members of the diplomatic corps.

The stand to the left of the track is the official tribune, very gay and attractive in the days of the Empire, when it was filled by the members of the municipal council of Paris and their families, but to-day rather a blot upon the picture, the wives of the Republican aediles belonging to a lower—though, in this case, a newer—stratum of society than did their imperial predecessors. The Jockey Club reserves for itself the first stand to the right, from which all women are rigorously excluded. The female element, however, is represented upon the lower ranges of benches, though the ladies belonging to the more exclusive circles of fashion prefer a simple chair upon the gravel of the paddock. It is there, at the foot of the club-stand, that may be seen any Sunday in spring, expanding under the rays of the vernal sun, the fresh toilettes that have bloomed but yesterday, or it may be this very morning, in the conservatories of Worth and Laferriere. The butterflies of this garden of sweets are the jaunty hats whose tender wings of azure or of rose have but just unfolded themselves to the light of day. My figure of "butterfly hats" has been ventured upon in the hope that it may be found somewhat newer than that of the "gentlemen butterflies" which the reporters of the press have chased so often and so long that the down is quite rubbed from its wings, to say nothing of the superior fitness of the comparison in the present case. In fact, the gentlemen do but very rarely flutter from flower to flower within the sacred confines of the paddock, but are much more apt to betake themselves in crowds to the less showy parterre of the betting-ground, where, under the shadow of the famous chestnut tree, such enormous wagers are laid, and especially do they congregate in the neighborhood of the tall narrow slates set up by such well-known bookmakers as Wright, Valentine and Saffery.

Each successive year sees an increase in the number of betters, who contribute indirectly, by means of subscriptions to the races, a very important proportion of the budget of the Jockey Club. But if any one should imagine from this constant growth of receipts that the taste for racing is extending in France, and is likely to become national, he would be making a great mistake: what is growing, and with alarming rapidity, is the passion for gambling, for the indulgence of which the "improvement of the breed of horses" is but a convenient and sufficiently transparent veil. Whether the money of the player rolls around the green carpet of the race-course or upon that of M. Blanc at Monte Carlo, the impulse that keeps it in motion is the same, and the book-maker's slate is as dangerous as the roulette-table. The manager of the one piles up a fortune as surely as the director of the other, and in both cases the money seems to be made with an almost mathematical certainty and regularity. They tell of one day—that of the Grand Prix of 1877—when Saffery, the Steel of the French turf and the leviathan of bookmakers, cleared as much as fifty thousand dollars. Wright, Valentine, Morris and many more make in proportion to their outlay. Four or five years ago these worthies had open offices on the Rue de Choiseul and the Boulevard des Italiens, where betting on the English and French races went on night and day; but the police, following the lead of that of London, stepped in to put an end to this traffic in contraband goods, and the shops for the sale of this sort of merchandise are now shut up. But if all this has been done, and if even those great voitures de poules which once made the most picturesque ornament of the turf, have been banished out of sight, it has been impossible to uproot the practice of betting, which has more devotees to-day than ever before. It has been discovered in other countries than France that the only way to deal with an ineradicable evil is to check its growth, and an attempt to prohibit pool-selling a year or two ago in one of the States of this Union only resulted in the adoption of an ingenious evasion whereby the pictures of the horses entered were sold at auction—a practice which is, if I am not misinformed, still kept up. The same fiction, under another form, is to be seen to-day in France. In order to bet openly one has to buy an entrance—ticket to the paddock, which costs him twenty francs, whereas the general entry to the grounds is but one franc, and any one found betting outside the enclosure or enceinte of the stables is liable to arrest. The police, no doubt, are willing to accept the theory that a man who can afford to pay twenty francs for a little square of rose- or yellow-tinted paper is rich enough to be allowed to indulge in any other extravagant freaks that he pleases.

But with all the numerous bets that are made, and the excitement and interest, that must necessarily be aroused, there is nothing of the turbulent and uproarious demonstration so characteristic of the English race-course. The "rough" element is kept away from the French turf, partly because it would find its surroundings there uncongenial with its tastes, and partly by the small entrance-fee required; and one is thus spared at Longchamps the sight of those specimens of the various forms of human misery and degradation that offend the eye at Epsom and infest even the more aristocratic meetings of Ascot and Goodwood. At the French races, too, one never hears the shrieks and howls of an English crowd, save perhaps when in some very important contest the favorite is beaten, and even then the yells come from English throats: it is the bookmakers' song of victory. A stranger at Longchamps would perceive at once that racing has no hold upon the popular heart, and that, so far as it is an amusement at all apart from the gambling spirit evoked, it is merely the hobby and pastime of a certain number of idle gentlemen. As to the great mass of spectators, who are not interested in the betting, they go to Longchamps as they would go to any place where uniforms and pretty toilettes and fine carriages are to be seen; for the Parisian, as one of them has well said, "never misses a review, and he goes to the races, although he understands nothing about them: the horses scarcely interest him at all. But there he is because he must do as 'all Paris' does: he even tries to master a few words of the barbarous jargon which it is considered bon-ton to speak at these places, for it seems that the French language, so rich, so flexible, so accurate, is insufficient to express the relations and affinities between man and the horse."

The enceinte du pesage, often called in vulgar English "the betting-ring," or the enclosure mentioned above to which holders of twenty-franc tickets are admitted, at Longchamps is scrupulously guarded by the stewards of the Jockey Club from the invasion of the demi-monde—a term that I employ in the sense in which it is understood to-day, and not in that which it bore twenty years ago. A woman of this demi-monde, which the younger Dumas has defined as that "community of married women of whom one never sees the husbands," may enter the paddock if she appears upon the arm of a gentleman, but the really objectionable element is obliged to confine itself to the five-franc stands or to wander over the public lawns. Some of the fashionable actresses of the day and the best-known belles-petites may be seen sunning themselves in their victorias or their "eight-springs" by the side of the track in front of the stands, but this is not from any interest that they feel in the performances of Zut or of Rayon d'Or, but simply because to make the "return from the races" it is necessary to have been to them, and every woman of any pretension to fashion, no matter what "world" she may belong to, must be seen in the gay procession that wends its way through the splendid avenue on the return from Longchamps.

The great day at Longchamps, that crowns the Parisian season like the "bouquet" at the end of a long series of fire-works, is the international fete of the Grand Prix de Paris, run for the first time in 1863. It is open to entire horses and to fillies of all breeds and of all countries, three-year-olds, and of the prize, one hundred thousand francs, half is given by the city of Paris and half by the five great railway companies. It was the late duc de Morny who first persuaded the municipal council and the administrations of the railways to make this annual appropriation; ail of which, together with the entries, a thousand francs each, goes to the winner, after deducting ten thousand francs given to the second horse and five thousand to the third. Last year the amount won by Nubienne, carrying fifty-three and a half kilogrammes, was one hundred and forty-one thousand nine hundred and seventy-five francs, and the time made was three minutes thirty-three seconds on a track of three thousand metres—one mile seven furlongs, or three furlongs longer than that of the Derby at Epsom.

The fixing of Sunday for this international contest has aroused the prejudices of the English, and has been the occasion of a long correspondence between Admiral Rous and Viscount Daru, but the committee on races has refused to change the day, contending, with reason, that the French people cannot be expected to exchange their usages for those of a foreign country. Although it is understood that Queen Victoria has formally forbidden the prince of Wales to assist at these profane solemnities, this interdict has not prevented the appearance there of some of the principal personages of England, and we have several times noticed the presence of the dukes of St. Albans, Argyll, Beaufort and Hamilton, the marquis of Westminster and Lords Powlett, Howard and Falmouth; though the last, be it said, is believed to be influenced by his respect for the day in his refusal to run his horses in France.

Those who remember the foundation of the Grand Prix will recall the extraordinary excitement of the occasion, when the whole population of Paris, as one of the enemies of the new system of racing said, turned out as they would to a capital execution or the drawing of a grand lottery or the ascension of a monster balloon: the next day the name of the winner was in everybody's mouth, and there was but one great man in the universe for that day at least—he who had conceived the idea of the Grand Prix de Paris. The receipts on this occasion amounted to eighty-one thousand francs: last year they were two hundred and forty thousand. I subjoin a list of the winners from 1863 to 1879, inclusive:

Years. Horses. Owners. Nationality.

1863 The Ranger H. Savile English. 1864 Vermont H. Delamarre French. 1865 Gladiateur Comte F. de Lagrange French. 1866 Ceylon Duke of Beaufort English. 1867 Feryacques A. de Montgomery French. 1868 The Earl Marquis of Hastings English. 1869 Glaneur A. Lupin French. 1870 Sornette Major Fridolin (Ch. French. Lafitte) 1871 (Not run). 1872 Cremorne H. Savile English. 1873 Boiard H. Delamarre French. 1874 Trent W.R. Marshall English. 1875 Salvator A. Lupin French. 1876 Kisber Baltazzi Hungarian. 1877 St. Christophe Comte F. de Lagrange French. 1878 Thurio Prince Soltikoff Russian. 1879 Nubienne Edmond Blanc French.

It will be seen by this list that the superiority of the English-bred horse over the French is far from being established. Of sixteen races, the English have gained but five, [Since this article was written the Grand Prix has again been won (June, 1880) by an English horse, Robert the Devil.] while they have been three times second and four times third, and in 1875 their three representatives came in last. The winner of the Epsom Derby has been beaten several times, as in the case, amongst others, of Blair Athol by Vermont and Doncaster by Boiard. The winners of the two chief prizes of last year were a French, an English and an Hungarian horse—Gladiateur, Cremorne and Kisber. It may be remarked also that the winner of the French Derby, as it is called, which is run at Chantilly a fortnight earlier, is almost never the gainer of the Grand Prix, the only exceptions having been Boiard and Salvator. This result is no doubt the consequence of the system of training too long in vogue in France, and upheld by Tom Jennings and the Carters, which consists in bringing a horse to the post in the maximum of his condition upon a given day and for a given event. The animal can never be in better state, and if he does not win the race for which he has been specially prepared, it is because he is not good enough: he cannot be made to do any better than he has done. But if it is hard to bring a horse to this culminating point of training, it is still more difficult to keep him there, even for a period of a few days. Training has been compared to the sides of a triangle: when one has reached the apex one must perforce begin to descend. It being, then, impossible that the animal should support for any length of time the extreme tension of his whole organism that perfect training supposes, it but very rarely happens that the horse prepared according to this system—for the French Derby, for example—can be maintained in such a condition as to enable him to win the Epsom Derby or the Grand Prix de Paris. We have heretofore referred to the reaction against this practice of excessive training, and to the efforts of Henry Jennings in the direction of a reform—efforts which within the last few years have been crowned with great success.

But we must now return to the Grand Prix. An invalid who had been forbidden by his doctor to read the newspapers for several months, and who should chance to make his first promenade on the Boulevards on the eve of the Grand Prix, would know at a glance that something extraordinary was about to happen. At every step he would meet the unmistakable garb that announces the Englishman on his travels—at every turn he would hear the language of Shakespeare and of Mr. Labouchere adorned with a good deal of horse-talk. Coney's Cosmopolitan Bar, Rue Scribe, is full on this day of betters and bookmakers, and possibly of Englishmen of a higher rank, whilst its silver gril—which is not of silver, however, but polished so bright as almost to look like it—smokes with the broiling steak, and the gin cocktails and brandy-and-soda flow unceasingly. Toward midnight, especially—after the Salon des Courses has closed its doors—is Coney's to be seen in its glory. The circus of the Champs Elysees, where Saturday is the favorite day, makes on this particular Saturday its largest receipts in the year; the Jardin Mabille is packed; the very hackney-coachmen wear the independent, half-insolent look that they have had since morning and will have till the evening of the next day—unfailing sign in Paris that some great spectacle is impending; milliners and dressmakers are out of their wits; the world has gone mad. The restaurant-waiters and the barbers of the Boulevard may condescend, if you happen to be a regular customer and given to tipping, to enlighten you on the chances of the respective horses. The most knowing in these matters are supposed to be Pierre, the host of the Grand Cafe, right under the rooms of the Jockey Club, and the rotund Henry, keeper of the Restaurant Bignon, Avenue de l'Opera, the confidant of certain turfmen, who may favor him with invaluable hints if their salmis of woodcocks should have been a success or their cotelette double be done to a turn. Charles, of the Cafe Durand, Place de la Madeleine, and Henry, the barber of the Boulevard des Italiens, are also posted in the quotations and keep themselves well informed.

On Sunday morning by ten o'clock the Bois de Boulogne is filled with pedestrians, who take their breakfast on the grass to while away the time of waiting. The restaurants Madrid and the Cascade, where the tables are spread amidst flowers and shaded by trees—a feature that is duly remembered in the bills, like an hors d'oeuvre—are turning visitors away. Toward half-past two the enclosure of the paddock is absolutely full: not a vacant chair is to be found, and a fearful consumption of iced champagne begins at the buffet. For, strange to say, the weather is always fine on this day, and the Encouragement Society is as notorious for its good-luck in this respect as the Skating Club and the Steeple-chase Society are for quite the opposite. By degrees—and perhaps helped by the champagne—the vast throng will be observed, as the supreme moment approaches, to depart from its habitually staid and calm demeanor, and finally to show some signs of enthusiasm, though without growing in the least noisy and turbulent, like that at Epsom on the Derby Day. Once in a year, however, I as the French say, doesn't make a custom, and the Parisian crowd, to quote its own expression, "croit que c'est arrive." The applause, in case the winner is a French horse, comes from patriotic motives: if he happens to be English it is given from a feeling of courtesy; and the crowd having done its duty in either case, the famous "return," that has often furnished a subject for the painter, begins. And a wondrous sight it is. Up to six o'clock the innumerable carriages continue to defile upon the several routes that lead to the city, forming a procession of which the head touches the Place de la Concorde, whilst the extremity still reaches to the tribunes of Longchamps. And when evening comes on, and bets are settled, and heated brains seek to prolong the day's excitement far into the night, such haunts as the Mabille grow so noisy that the police is generally obliged to interfere. There was a time when, on these occasions, that jolly nobleman, the duke of Hamilton, then a prominent figure on the French turf, did not disdain to lead his followers to the battle in person, and to practise the noble art of boxing upon all comers, whether policemen or bookmakers. But these deeds of former days are now but traditions: His Grace has married, which is said to have taught him wisdom, and the bookmakers have grown into millionaires, with a sense of the gravity becoming their position.—L. LEJEUNE.



MRS. PINCKNEY'S GOVERNESS

The short October day had come to an end. It had been one of those soft, misty, delicious days common enough at this season of the year. The gathering darkness perplexed the young girl who, without maid or escort of any kind, stood peering through the gloom at the little way-station. Discouraged, apparently, at the result of her search, she entered the station-house, and inquired, in rather a depressed voice, if they knew whether Mrs. Pinckney had sent a carriage or vehicle of any kind for her: "she was expected," she added.

Youth and good looks are naturally effective, and the young Irishman in authority there, Michael Redmond, was by no means insensible to their influence. He darted out with an air of alacrity, returning, however, almost immediately with the depressing information that Mrs. Pinckney's carriage was not there. "She went herself to the city this morning, madam," he said, with an effort at consolation. "Perhaps in her absence the servants have forgotten—" Here he paused.

"It is very unfortunate," she murmured, evidently not accustomed to such emergencies. Nature, however, although ill-seconded by her previous life, had given her both courage and decision. "Is there nothing here which I can hire? is there nobody to drive me to Mrs. Pinckney's?"

"I'll see, madam," returned the young man.

Why he used the term "madam," which was undoubtedly misplaced, toward so youthful a person, is only to be explained by an idea he had of exaggerated respect, a kind of protection apparently to her loneliness and helplessness.

He darted headlong out again into the darkness. "There is a boy here with an open wagon, madam," returning almost as quickly as he went out. "It is not an elegant conveyance, but—" and he hesitated—"it is the only one."

"Oh, it will do, thank you: anything will do which can carry me to the house. Is there room for my trunk?"

Michael with strong, serviceable arms swung the trunk lightly into the wagon. She was already seated, the boy, who was to drive, beside her.

"Oh, thank you." She drew a diminutive purse from her travelling-bag, and was evidently about to recompense him when something in his manner deterred her. She thanked him again, for gracious words fell lightly and easily from her lips, and the little vehicle went rattling out upon the road.

Mrs. Pinckney's house was four or five miles from the station: the boy drove at a furious pace, and it was by good luck rather than by good guidance that no catastrophe occurred. The beautiful day was succeeded by a cloudy evening: neither moon nor stars were visible, and as they passed through the avenue leading to the house, under the branches of magnificent old trees, large drops of rain began to fall. The light which shone through the open door revealed camp-chairs still standing on the lawn, and children's toys were scattered over the veranda. The boy's rough feet as he carried in her trunk annihilated the face of a smart French doll, and Miss Featherstone's dress caught on, and was torn by, a nail in a dilapidated rocking-horse. The light came from a picturesque-looking lamp which hung from an arch in the centre of a broad, low hall. She rang the bell: the sound reverberated through the house, yet no one came. The boy, who had stood the trunk on end, growing impatient, rang again: they heard voices, hubbub and confusion, children's cries, servants summoned, a man speaking very volubly in French. Then very imperfect English sentences were shouted in a kind of despair. The door was divided in the middle, with a large brass knocker as an appendage to the upper half. Miss Featherstone, growing anxious and impatient, sounded this vigorously, which brought a maid, who had evidently quite lost her head, to the door.

"This is Mrs. Pinckney's?" said the young girl in prompt, cheerful tones. "I am Miss Featherstone, the governess, whom Mrs. Pinckney expects."

"Yes, ma'am," replied the servant in an absent, distracted manner.

"Marie!" shrieked the French voice in shrill tones of alarm and anger.

"Please, miss, I must go. Do come in and sit down: I'll send somebody—"

"Marie! Marie!—Where is that vilaine femme?"

At the second summons she fled, leaving Miss Featherstone and the boy, standing with her trunk on his shoulders, on the threshold.

The young girl walked in, sat down in a large leathern chair, and was taking out her purse to pay her driver when a little fat man, with a very red face and bushy black hair, came flying through the hall, carrying a child in his arms. He was followed by two or three sobbing children and the girl whom Miss Featherstone had already seen. "My dear mees," he said, never stopping until he reached the governess, "see this leetle enfant, this cher petit Henri. He has already one contortion—spasm—what you call it?—and I fear he goes to have one other. Ma chere mademoiselle, have you some experience? Is it that you know what we shall do?"

The child lay pale and unconscious in the arms of the distressed little foreigner. Miss Featherstone tore off her gloves; her purse, unheeded, fell on the floor; she led the way into the nearest room, which proved to be the dining-room, the helpless group following. "Bring a tub of hot water for his feet," she said in calm, decided tones. She was seated, and had taken the child in her arms.—"Now, monsieur"—to the Frenchman—"will you be kind enough to give me some ice from that pitcher on the sideboard behind you?"

She drew a delicate little handkerchief from her pocket, and, putting pieces of ice in it, held it to the child's head. "Some one," she continued, "take off his shoes and stockings."

Her composure restored a degree of order, although no one seemed to have recovered their senses sufficiently to obey her as to the child's shoes. The boy who had acted as her driver knelt down and proceeded to accomplish it. When the poor little feet were up to the knees in hot water and the child was evidently reviving, she said, "The doctor should be sent for immediately. As this boy has a horse and wagon at the door, it would be best to send him. What is the name of your family physician?"

"Doctor Harris."

"You know where he lives?"

"Oh yes, ma'am, very well."

"Stop a moment: some one write a line, so that there shall be no mistake."

The foreigner flung up his hands with a gesture of despair. "It is so difficile for me to write l'Anglais—" he began.

With the child lying on her left arm she opened her bag with her right—the little driver, the most collected person besides herself of the party, holding it up to her—found a scrap of paper and a pencil and wrote a brief, urgent appeal to the physician to come immediately, mentioning that the mother was from home, and signing herself "Laura Featherstone, governess."

Sooner than she would have believed possible Doctor Harris appeared: he came in his own gig, the little driver who had been so active in the events of the evening vanishing entirely from the scene, and, as it was afterward remembered, in the confusion without his douceur.

Doctor Harris, a comparatively young man, was cheerful and reassuring. "There will probably be no recurrence of the convulsions," he said, examining the child, who was sleeping tranquilly in the young girl's arms; "but what was the exciting cause? what has he been eating?"

"I find him with a grand heap of the raisins and the nuts," replied the French tutor excitedly. "Madame goes to town this morning and takes la bonne pour s'en servir—le pauvre enfant est abandonne, voila tout!" Gesticulating with much vehemence, he sat down at the conclusion as if exhausted by his efforts.

"What has been done for the child?" asked the physician in a cautious whisper.

The little Frenchman rose; his eyes flashed; he waved his fat, short arms toward Miss Featherstone: "Cette chere mademoiselle, she is one angel from the sky: she do it all," with increased animation and violence—"ice for his head, hot water for his feet. I could not tink, I was so *accable"

This vehement declamation not being calculated to ensure the patient's slumbers, Doctor Harris ordered the little fellow to be undressed and put to bed immediately. "I should like to see you, my dear young lady, when you are at leisure," he said as Miss Featherstone rose, still with the child in her arms, and was following the maid to the nursery: "I have directions to leave in case of a recurrence. However, I don't think there will be any return of the convulsions," he added.

The maid, reduced to helplessness by terror, looked on while Miss Featherstone undressed the sleeping boy. She laid him in the bed, ordered the servant to sit by his side until her return, put the candle on the floor so that it would not shine in his face, and went out to meet the doctor.

"Who will be with the child during the night?" was his first query.

"Helas! I do not know," cried the foreigner with a gesture of despair.

"If there is no one else to take care of him I will," replied the young girl cheerfully.

"It is infame!" said the tutor.—"Cette chere mademoiselle has but arrived: she is weary. Parbleu! she must be hungry. Why not somebody tink of dis?—My dear mees, have you had dinner? Non? J'en etais sur," with a groan.

Mr. Brown—for that was the tutor's very English name—was so dramatic in the expression of his good feeling that Miss Featherstone could not repress a smile as she turned to the physician, and, taking out her pencil and a little memorandum-book, said, "If you'll give me directions, Doctor Harris, I think that I'm perfectly competent to take care of the child."

Doctor Harris, who was gallant and a bachelor, made a whispered remonstrance referring to her fatigue, but she replied gravely, "I am in perfect health, and it never makes me ill to sit up with a sick person: I have had experience." Some painful remembrance evidently agitated her, for her voice suddenly failed.

They were interrupted by the sound of carriage-wheels rolling rapidly up the avenue.

"Voici madame!" cried Mr. Brown, who flew to the door to hand Mrs. Pinckney out.

He had taken the earliest opportunity to enlighten her as to the child's illness, for they heard her exclaim, "I know it: oh, I have heard of it! Where is the doctor?"

Mrs. Pinckney was tall and slight: she had blonde hair, large, beautiful eyes—they were blue—and regular features. In short, she was exceedingly pretty: so thought Doctor Harris, and he made many salaams before her.

"Oh, doctor," she exclaimed, rushing up to him and grasping his arm, "is there any danger? Tell me, is there any danger?"

"Not the slightest, ma'am," he replied promptly.

She wouldn't be reassured: "But why not? Convulsions are so serious, they are so terrible! I had a relative who was ruined for life by epilepsy: he was a handsome fellow, but he lost good looks, mind, everything. Oh, Doctor Harris, don't tell me that my poor little Harry is to have epilepsy!" She had the art of puckering her forehead into a thousand wrinkles, yet looking lovely in spite of it.

"I certainly shall not tell you anything of the kind," said the doctor with a reassuring smile, "for it wouldn't be true; but who is the relative who had epilepsy?"

"Oh, a nephew of my husband, and he had a dreadful fall. He fell out of a second-story window: it was in the country, and rather a low house, but it finished him, poor fellow! Oh, doctor, sit down: I am tired to death, and this news has so upset me! Will you assure me, upon your honor, that my child will never have epilepsy?"

"Sincerely, Mrs. Pinckney, I don't think there is the least danger; but you must be careful as to what he eats. Nuts and raisins are not a particularly wholesome diet for a child three years old."

She looked about inquiringly, and did not seem the least surprised as her eye fell on Miss Featherstone.

The tutor, still irate from his alarm, exclaimed, "You take la bonne, madame. I am occupy with mes eleves: then I am not in his care."

Mrs. Pinckney, who was not an irritable woman, took no notice of this implied reproach: "What is to be done with him to-night, Doctor Harris? Can you sleep here?" As he shook his head, "You'll come the first thing in the morning? Oh, doctor, can I go to bed and sleep comfortably? Do you assure me that there is not the slightest danger of a recurrence of those dreadful spasms?"

When the distressed mother spoke of sleeping comfortably a smile, which all his admiration for the fair widow could not restrain, flickered over Doctor Harris's face: "I was about to give this young lady"—and he turned to Miss Featherstone—"directions for the night, as we didn't expect you home: she has been very kind and efficient, and was going to take care of the child; but now—"

He was interrupted by Mrs. Pinckney crossing the room, seizing Miss Featherstone's hand and kissing her with effusion: "My dear Miss Featherstone—your name is Featherstone, is it not?—I have no words to thank you sufficiently."

"Oh, the chere mees!" burst forth the little Frenchman. "I was so full of frighten I not know what to do, which way to turn myself; and she, so calm, so smooth," he said, hesitating for a word, and apparently discomfited when he found it—"she take the helm, she issue the orders: every one obey, and the child is saved." After this peroration he glanced around as if for applause.

"I was about to say," resumed Doctor Harris, "that, now that the nurse has returned, Miss Featherstone, who has been travelling all day, had better have some dinner and be sent to bed."

"Oh, certainly," replied Mrs. Pinckney; "and now that I'm so much relieved I'd like some dinner myself.—Mr, Brown, do you know what prospects there are of our having any dinner?"

The tutor shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands with a deprecatory gesture: "I know not, my dear madame. Les enfants et moi, we have our dinner at two o'clock: we did not comprehend that madame would return to-night," as a happy apologetic afterthought.

Mrs. Pinckney glanced at a little watch which she took from her belt: "Twelve o'clock, but the servants probably have not gone to bed."—She rang the bell. "Mary," to a maid who entered, "tell the cook to make some tea and send in cold chicken or beef—whatever is left from dinner."

"I think the fire is out, Mrs. Pinckney," the servant hesitatingly replied.

"Oh, no matter: let her get a few chips and make a fire: I must have my tea."—Doctor Harris rose. "Oh, doctor, don't go until you have taken one more look at my darling."

The nursery was on the same floor. Mrs. Pinckney insisted on kissing the child, much to the physician's annoyance. He checked her, and carefully refrained from talking himself while in the room. As he was taking leave at the front door she repeated, "Now, doctor, you're sure I can be comfortable—that I can go to bed and go to sleep? Tell me positively"—and she looked earnestly in his face—"that the child will never have another convulsion."

He laughed, and bent an admiring tender, gaze on the pretty mother, who stood appealingly before him: "My dear Mrs. Pinckney, I cannot swear positively that Harry will never have another convulsion, particularly if he is allowed to eat nuts and raisins ad libitum: however, with ordinary care I don't think it at all probable."—"Is it possible," he reflected as he drove home, "that I want to marry that woman, selfish and inconsiderate as she is? Why, she would have let the governess, a perfect stranger, sit up with the child if I hadn't interfered! She is awfully pretty, though. I can't help liking her: then, her money would be a comfortable addition to my professional emoluments."