assignees renewed their attempts to collect the debts due to the defaulter. Many, however, to whom applications were made, still refused to pay. At length the Noble Lord to whom allusion has already been made, entered the room, and distinctly stated that, upon principle, he should still refuse to abide by the alleged decision of the Jockey Club now exhibited.

"In the first place, his Lordship denied that this was a decision of the Jockey Club, a portion only of whom had been summoned, and some of those were personally interested in the issue of the question before them. With regard to the persons to whom the settlement of the account was intrusted, he objected to making them the medium of an adjustment which required personal explanations from their principal. It was the duty of the defaulter to have come forward, and settle his own accounts; and if he so came, and paid and received, pari passu, his Lordship was perfectly willing, as he had all along been, to pay over to him the sum which he had lost. He could not recognise the doctrine, that individuals who had lost sums to this person should pay those sums into the hands of irresponsible persons, without any guarantee that the winners would ever receive the amount of their claims. The position for which he contended was, that men should not be permitted to enter that room to take the chance of winning, and to receive those winnings, without the persons to whom they had lost being assured of receiving the full amount of their respective claims. In this case the creditors had no definite prospect of payment; and hence the course attempted to be pursued was not only unprecedented, but altogether irregular. Several persons took the same view with his Lordship, and declared that demands had been made upon them, which were not accurately stated, and which, in the absence of the defaulter, could not be set right. One of the assignees said, that the settlement of the account would long since have taken place, had not the Noble Lord refused to pay, and had not others followed his example; and with regard to any inaccuracies in the amount of claims, these were open to easy explanation, which the defaulter was perfectly ready to give. A good deal of angry discussion followed, in which the Noble Lord altogether repudiated the assertion, that he had been the first to refuse to pay the defaulter, not having arrived in the yard till after the defaulter had retired. It was urged, by some, that the creditors being satisfied with the intention of the defaulter to pay in full, the debtors had no right to withhold their losses, and that the decision obtained from the Jockey Club was in itself conclusive. The Noble Lord denied the justice of this argument, and repeated, that the posted resolution was, in point of fact, of no value; while a door would be opened to interested creditors to screen a fraudulent debtor, merely for the purpose of securing a dividend for themselves, without regard to that reciprocity of risk upon which all fair betting should be based. If, however, the assignees would give a guarantee that the whole of the creditors should be paid in full at some definite period, he was perfectly willing to hand over the amount of his loss instanter This guarantee was at first refused, but ultimately the three assignees signed the following undertaking:

"We, the undersigned, guarantee that the account of Mr. shall be paid in full by the end of the Houghton Meeting,"

"Upon this document being placed in the hands of one of the stewards of the Jockey Club, the Noble Lord forthwith paid the sum claimed of him, and publicly expressed a hope that all other persons indebted to the defaulter would follow his example. All he desired, he said, was to prevent the establishment of a precedent which might hereafter lead to mischievous consequences."

Here is a very good account of the affair, as far as it goes; but we really cannot see the service likely to come of all its mystification; on the contrary, it may work much inconvenience. The defaulter appears as a Mr. G.; now, there are several Mr. G,'s. betting men, and what is to prevent our country cousins from concluding that Mr. Gully has exploded, or Mr. Greatrex gone off? Then, what need for such obscurity, about the assignees, or the "Noble Lord," the leading actor in the statement? The facts are simply these: the party against whom a "fiat" of honour has issued, is a Mr. Gurney, who appears, from all that has yet transpired, to have acted unwisely, but not with dishonesty. The assignees being his largest creditors (selon les régles), are Messrs. Portman, Beales, and Clarke; and the nobleman, who takes leave to look before he pays, is Lord George Bentinck. For so doing, his Lordship was in every way justified. There was evidently some shuffling or juggling going forward, and he claimed to have the merits of the case, if any such it had, placed before him, by which to come at a decision. As to the actual arrangement made, it is lame and impotent in the extreme, and obnoxious to such a phalanx of casualties, that a Chancery suit is plain-sailing to it. But in whatever way this instance may turn out, it will serve the general knowledge upon the system of "betting round," the bane and pestilence of the turf in the present day.

We extract the following from a lively little monthly brochure, entitled "The Bude Light," the first number of which made its appearance last month.

APROPOS OF THE DERBY.-It was the last Monday but one of the past month, and a true Saxon boy, with his glowing cheeks, and flowing locks of the colour of the fleece, stood beside his father in the classic circle wont to assemble on the first day of the Epsom week in Tattersall's yard. Some of the company appeared to harmonize so indifferently with the others, that the lad was fain to inquire who they might be, and what their business? "They are legs,' said papa. "Are legs gentlemen?" asked the youth. "Not exactly," quoth the sire. "But gentlemen associate with them," persisted the son; converse, walk-." "No, they don't walk," urged the informant, "they stroll about here, but when they go out into the streets-" "Ah," said the lad, with a knowing smile, "when the legs go, they walk off with themselves.

How many a truism is spoken in jest! How many a really good thing

"Wastes its sweetness on the desert air!"

Diogenes went about with his lantern, when

the sun was up, looking for an honest man. We go about with our

"Bude," searching for wit, fun, and frolic, at

all hours and seasons;

and old Jem Bland will lay you ten to one that we catch more in one hour than the philosopher in a century. Catering for larks, we lately went where most they do resort, even to the sod known unto gods as Banstead, and unto men as Epsom race-course: and here comes the issue to which our introductory conversation was apropos.

The Derby is over; the shindy it created will last the legs for ever. With them was its origin? When "the General" sneezed, who was up to snuff? But sorely have they been bombarded in the modern siege of Belgrade. The recent mystification at Epsom, however it might have worked temporary inconvenience to the great speculators, played the devil with the industrious classes. The days of Turpin and Duval were past; but there remained a little gentlemanlike legerdemain still now, though no longer fine rogues swagger out their breath at Tyburn, there is the treadmill, or the union-house, to carry off the small dealers in larceny or loose morals.

:

"That in the captain's but a choleric word,

Which in the soldier were flat blasphemy."

CRICKET. This noble game ran a prosperous career during the past month. Our limits do not allow us to record more than the results of two of the principal matches to which it gave existence.

Marylebone Club and Ground against the Five Northern Counties. This important contest between the great Metropolitan Club and the élite of the counties of Derby, Stafford, Leicester, Nottingham, and York, began on Monday, 31st May, at Lord's, and caused very general interest. The ground was in splendid order, the weather very propitious, and the assemblage combined all the leading patrons of Cricket in London, and many from the provinces.

2nd do. 30

bowled by C. Taylor, Esq. 12 ct. by Hillyer, bowled by Bayley 0 bowled by Bayley

18

hit wicket, bd. Whittaker, Esq. 28 bowled by C. Taylor, Esq.

bowled br Whittaker, Esq.

10

4

25

9

Byes 8, wide balls 4, no balls 2..14

Total

7

3

bowled by Cobbett

..

0

bowled by Cobbett

..-162

Sussex against Kent. The match between these rival counties commenced on Monday, the 7th ult., at the Royal Grounds, Brighton: the result, on this occasion, was tolerably decisive.

SPECULATION, since Ascot Races, has been all but laid aside. The election movement carried from the Corner the proper prey of the spoiler, and hawks are too wise to "pike out hawks' een." What little betting there was, is quoted below-the Leger, as it will be seen, being wholly out of the market. It is possible the result of Goodwood meeting will be to throw some life into the present stagnation; but it will never be a good betting race. The late Derby has acted as a heavy blow and a great discouragement upon the traffic in bookmaking.

57

LITERATURE.

THE NATURALIST'S LIBRARY. Conducted by Sir William Jardine. Mammalia. Vol. XII. HORSES. The Equidæ, or Genus Equus of Authors. By Lieut. Col. Chas. Hamilton Smith, K.H., &c. &c. &c. Edinburgh: Lizars, St. James's-square; and London, Highley, 32, Fleet-street.

1841.

THIS is infinitely the most elaborate and complete treatise on the history of the horse that has yet been attempted by any naturalist. It contains a mass of curious and interesting information, wholly novel, mixed with as little compilation as the nature of the undertaking permitted. Colonel Smith has treated his subject like a master who enters upon a thesis which he has studied till it becomes an old and favourite friend. None of its details are too minute for his attention, or too difficult to command his industrious investigation. In all the views he entertains of the origin and habitat of the genus equus we fully agree. His theories are very ingenious, and his facts sought and established with consummate skill. Our limits do not furnish such extracts as would do justice to the philosophy of this admirable work : the passages subjoined, however, will afford some idea of its style and principle. It is to be regretted that in it there are instances of a practice that has grown into a great inconvenience in recent books of travels and natural history. We allude to the habit of each writer adopting an orthography of his own in the case of proper names. Colonel Smith, for example, always gives us Tahtary for Tartary, as familiar to our eyes as any household word. But these are, indeed, spots that can scarce offend, where all is so bright and excellent. There can be no doubt this volume of the "Naturalist's Library" will become one of the most popular of the series; and this conviction consoles us for the meagre notice of it to which we are restricted. We repeat, the following passages are selected for the purpose of giving specimens of the style in which this volume is written those who desire to profit by the store of instruction which it contains, would not be served by having it retailed to them in garbled extracts.

"The confidence of a horse in a firm rider and his own courage is great, as was conspicuously evinced in the case of an Arab possessed by the late Gen. Sir Robert R. Gillespie, who being present on the race-course of Calcutta during one of the great Hindu festivals, when several hundred thousand people may be assembled to witness all kinds of shows, was suddenly alarmed by the shrieks of the crowd, and informed that a tiger had escaped from his keepers: the Colonel immediately called for his horse, and grasping a boar-spear, which was in the hands of one among the crowd, rode to attack this formidable enemy: the tiger probably was amazed at finding himself in the middle of such a number of shrieking beings, flying from him in all directions; but the moment he perceived Sir Robert, he crouched with the attitude of preparing to spring at him, and that instant the gallant soldier passed his horse in a leap over the tiger's back, and struck the spear through his spine. The horse was a small grey, afterwards sent home by him a present to the Prince Regent. When Sir Robert fell at the storming of Kalunga, his favourite black charger, bred at the Cape of Good Hope, and carried by him to India, was, at the sale