THE OMNIBUS.

"There he sat, and, as I thought, expounding the law and the prophets, until on drawing a little nearer, I found he was only expatiating on the merits of a brown horse."-BRACEBRIDGE HALL.

The First and Second October-"The Eccentric Joey Jones "-A Peep at the Houghton-Védette-Stud Mems.-Derby Horses-Our Annual Huntsman List-Hunting Gossip-The late Mr. Assheton Smith-A Visit to the Pytcheley Kennels.

Taking the meetings throughout the month, they have, at Newmarket especially, been quite beyond the average. Palm Leaf proved at Harrow that there was something in William Day's early notions about her. At Bedford, Nucleus, another Newminster, gladdened the heart of her breeder, Captain Skipwith, and the horse's subscription was within a day or two announced as full. Flying Dutchman is advertised to be let for one or two seasons. We are not sorry for it, as we dislike the plan of shareholders letting to shareholders. Fisherman made a sad finish here for the Queen's Plate, and Winkfield, the ci-devant Ascot Cup winner, had Bracken and Orson to keep him in countenance in a Hunters' Stake! Strange to say, not one of Lord Zetland's horses ran at Richmond, and in fact he has scarcely had a two-year-old or three-year-old fit this season. Gaylass by Teddington kept up that wonderful prestige, which the fillies of the mighty chesnut are acquiring. They are never done starting up and cutting down all before them, and scarcely a decent colt comes out save the game Solomon. Rachel was second to Marseillaise in the Twos and Threes. Poor old Job Marson mourned sadly over this mare, when they took her from him at Beverley, as he thought he had got a second Nancy. The Marseillaise and Archduchess running, which was so strangely in and out at Northallerton, was in the latter's favour here, while Shafto acted up to the "medio tutissimus ibis" motto in all three races. The Vaticans came out rather strong at Chesterfield, and ditto Princess of Orange, and, as usual, there was some very close racing, and two dead heats in one race.

At the Newmarket First October, Mayonaise scored well for Teddington (whose dam has honoured him with an own brother at last); but still she left an impression on trainers' minds that she is a bit of a jade. Farmer's Son, who could hardly live the pace any part of the way, astonished everybody by the style in which he carried 7st. 71b. in the Eastern Counties Handicap, and won at a mile and a quarter. Ariadne, a little low mare in blooming condition, as all John Day's string are this autumn, made light of the Champagne and the Chesterfield forms, by cutting down Prelude and Cantine in the Hopeful; and Toxophilite was alike unceremonious with Knight of Kars. When we remember how the latter, when decidedly unfit, ran Saunterer to a head at Doncaster, Tox's mile form must be great. Prelude's running is un

accountably bad; and Cantine was as fretful as ever. Ariadne's action is very scratchy when she gets into trouble, and she will never stay. It is not to her and Mayonaise that we must look to win next year's Oaks, but rather to Castanette and Elcot filly, as far as we can see now. On dit that, at this meeting, a sporting baronet strolled into the green cloth dominions, asked what was in the bank? and on being told that there was £5,000, replied, "Ah! Well, I'll answer to that! and made a clean sweep.

Lord Derby (whose mares Meteora and Canezon are both barren this season), was fortunate with Streamer in the Royal Stakes, at the Second October. He would have sold him for £50 at Doncaster, if the purchaser would have taken up his Royal Stakes forfeit; but although it seemed a certainty that he could save his stake, no one dare risk it. As it was, his lordship had to keep his roarer, and made a cool £410 by him after paying off Beadsman. The friends of the pair were as frightened of each other, as Chatham and Attila's were; but really, when there was a stake for second, such coyness was thrown away. We hear that one trainer sent a friend to have a look at his opponent's horse's legs, as it stood turned round in its Ditch Stables stall, but that two aide-de-camps espied him, and effectually blocked the doorway by standing in it. Several of Sir Joseph's string have had a sort of low fever, and have been sadly weak for some months past. Their stable at Cannon's Heath, where John Scott's father originally trained, is a barn converted by the application of a roof into ten or twelve stalls, and there is a sort of half stagnant pond so near its door where frogs and beetles revel, and cart-horses drink, to which many attribute the malaria. As for Beadsman, with such upright pasterns as he has, it is a perfect marvel that he ever stood a preparation at all. He must be wretchedly moderate at best, or John and Alfred Day would not have missed him as they did. Lord Glasgow's string arrived in great force, and rising like a giant refreshed, as on the closing Houghton day of '52, he won three times, received once, and paid once on the first day. Paying £350 in two matches, and receiving £350 in two more, was the result of his other matches of the week. Teddington started up with another of his flying fillies in the Fifty Pound Plate, and the Cesarewitch brought out the largest number of starters (many of them old celebrities) that it ever had. Sunbeam hardly won her race from Eurydice as a St. Leger winner should; Ariadne made a fool of Pandora; and Lord Zetland won a match with Ralpho. Neither her nor Viking are much liked by those who have scanned them. It would have been well if the Atlantic telegraph had been right, and Prioress had a second Cesarewitch to transmit by it; and Mr. Ten Broeck must rather regret the ill-luck which led him to incur the 7lb. Doncaster winning penalty. As for the Roman Candle men, we have not the most earthly sympathy with their sufferings. They must back horses at their peril, whether they be Jockey Club ones or whether they are not; and if Admiral Rous wont do the indignation," the papers must. Rocket is a ragged style of horse. They had tried him with Tame Deer and Queenstown, and when the latter who received a lump of weight in the trial, won on the Monday, they at once saw their chance. Another stride or two and it is said that Mr. Ten Broek would have landed nearly £30,000.

3

A lovely autumn day, with partridges and pheasants feeding everywhere, opened on us, as we left London in the cold grey morning, about half-past six, for Newmarket, and never were Houghtonians so favoured before. The "eccentric Joey Jones" kept us alive all the way down, and astonished passengers, porters, and policemen alike. One of the latter faintly attempted to pay him back at Cambridge, and had to retire amid a roar; but a card-seller "cross-countered" him at Dullingham, and won that round most uumistakeably. On the Heath he appeared in light-check trowsers, and about nine gilt chains to his watch, and with Jem Ward in the chair, gave a soirée on the Cambridgeshire evening. Among other hanky-panky trieks he gammoned a cab-driver to let him ride on the box, and suddenly threw himself on to the horse's back, and clung there as it raced past the betting-rooms. There was quite an exclamation of horror at the incident; but a Manchester book-maker stilled it, when he said, "Oh! don't mind, it's only Thoey Thones." On Thursday evening he was at hand when Paddock and The Champion had an unpleasant meeting in the High-street. Paddock was for stripping to the buff then and there, but The Champion deemed it derogatory, after having thrashed his man in June, to have a mere "turn up" in October, and "stern, like Ajax spectre, stalked away." The crowd got noisy, and cheered Paddock, but "Thoey" made them forget all by some wild antics with a covered dish of meat, on a baker's tray, which was en route for the White Hart. A young jockey seems to be the Compton of the sporting world just now. The answer which he gave the sea-captain at Yarmouth, when he asked him where he learnt to play pool, was capital in its way; but the mock gravity with which he took off his hat on the Folkestone pier, and delivered a somewhat sanguinary valediction to France (where he had got into trouble with the starter), sent "The Emperor," and one of his friends shaking with laughter half the way to London.

Ancient Briton was all the go when we alighted at Newmarket. Some would have it he had been tried with Sunbeam and Saunterer, and that the latter had given 21 lbs., and only run a bad third to him. There was also a little talk about Pryoress, but she never came in earnest till night, when there was a long tale of her having been tried with Barbarity and Eclipse, and that speed was her decided forte. Mr. Ten Broeck lives a great deal at Newmarket, and has some shooting hard by. His American waggon, with the American trotting horses, which are, so it is said, to be matched to trot some 18 miles an hour, when the season is over, was much gazed at on the Heath; and so was his trainer, Minor, with his cut beard, his cloth cap, and his spectacles. Joey Jones took care not to miss him in The Second October. We could readily believe the story of the horses being perpetually washed, as the ugly red-legged Prioress looked, at the Cambridgeshire post, as if she had been badly rough-dried. In fact, no one, to see her, would like to give £30 for her; and yet in spite of this, and the much-laughedat mode of five-mile work, hardly lobbing along the first three miles, and then increasing the pace into a regular spurt at the end, she contrived again to be among the foremost lot. "Bonita, by Financier, out of Sarah Washington, by Garnison's Zinganee, grandam Stella

by Contention," looked hardly worth the Duke of Bedford's acceptance, and the £50 will just go to pay her Derby and Oaks forfeits.

The Criterion field was wretchedly small, but great in quality, King-at-arms looked beautiful, and round and plump as a par tridge, but he is too short. He is a wonderfully nice horse to walk behind; but there seems to be a tendency among the Kingstons, so far, to be rather brilliant than staying. Promised Land had undergone a complete change of shape since Goodwood. In fact, we should not have even known him again, except perhaps by his head. No horse could have been fitter; he looks as if he had grown nearly halfa-hand, and is a large three-cornered edition of his brother Happy Land. There is a rare shoulder, and a blood-like head, which he keeps high in the air; but he has ne arms, nothing behind the saddle; a short quarter and a high leg, and turns his left foot tremendously out. It was quite odd to follow in his track afterwards. North Lincoln hardly looked so blooming to the eye as he did at Ascot. His barrel is becoming beautifully cylindrical; but the point of his shoulders is, perhaps, a trifle thick. It struck us that they could have made him fitter if they had liked; but he is rather a pet horse, and they do not let into him so strongly as they otherwise might do. He was very quiet, and sweated a trifle between the legs at starting, and seemed lazy; but he shook his head from side to side, and fairly champed his bit when Wells sent him off. They had scarcely gone 100 yards before Wells seemed to "command them;" but King-at-Arms rose the hill as well as anything; and 100 yards from home they began to shout for him. Still there was no mistaking the Newmarket shout half-a-mile off, which told that Woodyeates had gone down; and then came the second edition of it, rather fainter, when they took the horse round to the Baroness's carriage,

The Barons's two strings were almost the only ones we saw out at the Bury Hill, when we walked forth late the next morning, though Gipsey King, it is true, was most industrious. The yearlings were led by a chesnut with remarkable quality, who looked like a Leopold; and a long raking chesnut and a bay, both of them King Toms, followed in his wake. The much-talked-of Brother to Sydney walked second in the senior string, and is a chesnut with immense thighs and quarters. Vindex paraded the town during the morning, and has a wonderfully round barrel now; and shows a great improvement altogether; but still he is a rib short of what he should be, and there is a lack of ease in the way his hind-quarters are put on. Messrs. Barrows had four stallions at their paddocks. There is Yellow Jack, who is a nice horse if he was rather better below the knee; and little Black Doctor. He has not height enough to please the foreigners, who mostly stand out for fifteen two, whereas he is barely fifteen. Poor old Cowl was groping his blind way about a straw-yard, which he only reached last week from Sir Joseph Hawley's. He is in good case, and shows no symptoms of the terrible break-down, when he carried Job Marson in at Goodwood with his hind fetlocks fairly dragging on the ground. Alarm was No. 4 of the party; but the old horse is out of condition now, and the attitude of pain in which he

stands from perpetual fever in the feet prevents one from seeing him to any advantage.

Secret Treasure was just winning the Feather Plate as we reached the Heath; and there was another triumph for the Daniel O'Rourke blood. Tom Parr also thinks very highly of his Daniel-begotten Gaspard; and the little Sledmere chesnut has done well for his first season. We never care to look at those chicken sweepstakes, so productive of pots and pulls, which seem to create such frantic excitement. Really, when My Niece and Mainstay were running for a mere £100 affair, there was as much noise and rushing, and as much clustering near the Bushes, as if a Two Thousand were coming off. Alas! if some owners who come to the Houghton did not get a little money out of, or win a little money on their horses in these little goes, they would hardly be able to scratch over the winter.

There was not much to notice in the Cambridgeshire field, except that two Cambridgeshire winners and three Cesarewitch ones were part of it. Julia was saddled close by the hedge, near the turn of the lands, and seems as if her barrel was little bigger than a five-month lamb's. Like her sire, her pasterns are terribly upright; and, taking her altogether, she is thinned down into a complete phantom-steed. Beacon went as well as anything, and with a very long stride; and none looked more beautiful than Underhand. There is, however, only just fifteen hands of him; but still, at 7st. 8lb., Eurydice would have hardly beaten him. Farmer's Boy was-next to him-the prettiest horse in the race but he was never quiet from the time he was mounted; and they fancy that he must have hit his leg, as he was "as sound as a smelt" when he left his stable. We never saw Ignoramus look better, and none the worse for the four-mile dance Ducrow had led him, in his shoes, the week before, at the Caledonian Hunt. The first part of the performance was the running away of Bellona and Lifeboat, who solemnly galloped up the cords, with one of the Mr. Morrisses, on a black pony, in hot pursuit. "It's a towner," said the jockey-lads; and a towner it certainly was. There seemed some fate against Bellona. It was a very long time before they could find her to saddle; and this was the result after she was saddled and yet she ran well, in spite of it. The many-coloured line was grand to see, as it swept past the Duke's Stand; and soon after that, Ancient Briton (whose joint-owners' partnership is, on dit, about to be dissolved) was out of it. Nat kept Underhand on the top side; but the blue stripes were in hopeless difficulty, from the weight, a hundred yards from home; the very best horse on Middleham Moor" could do no more; and Eury-dice-as the crowd, to the horror of the Cantabs, would call her came on as she liked. Mr. Sutton was ready to receive her; and she was walked off, with her owner, Mr. Tom Drake, and Jem Mason, in attendance. She is like her sister Impérieuse; but there is rather less of her, and her quarters and gaskins are not so powerful. The royal Eulogy family have been lucky both in price and performances. Beginning with Impérieuse (480 gs.), there is the St. Leger: then comes Eurydice (75 gs.). Mr. Sutton followed up the blood the next year with a half-brother (430gs.) by Pyrrhus the First, but he has put out curbs;