"Oh! for my home! my noble sire's good hall !" The soldier fights for thirteen pence a day; The captain for more stipend, and the hope I write "these presents" even as did Pope Fine feelings are a matter of finance Under a net five hundred pounds a year, I ever have been puzzled to divine, At regimental messes: As though gold-lace, and braided dresses, Gave attic flavour to the trash, The staple cawing, of those human rookeries. The fact, however, cannot be gainsaid: Behold me, then, once more "at my old lunes," Swift is my authority for this assertion, in one of his letters to Bolingbroke, or Gay. "Am I a baste, to browse?" O'Holsters said; The fact that I indulge in such 'pong-shong: '- Duly enlisted, when the dragoons, Into the squad which they yclep'd their " A corps embodied to make up a party spoons ;" Enough of such digression; and once more "A change is o'er the spirit of the dream." Black as the fiend is Green: O'Holsters' form Betrays the low'ring that portends a storm. "I mean to say" (here Green seem'd iterating Something that he had previously been stating,) "I'm not asham'd that I affect primroses;' D— me! though others may turn up their noses. What I've to say is this, I love the country, And wish that I was settled there : D- me! d'ye think I care For Lieutenant O'Holsters's effrontery?" Dire was the scowl wherewith the chafed dragoon, Arising to depart, replied, "My buck, If you're in any tolerable luck, Your wish is likely to be granted soon." And, passing Green, he whisper'd, with a wink, "Sooner, my lad of wax, than you may think." The stars have left the sky, but 'tis not day— Alas! 'tis over-true-change name and place- Brief time the ghostly forms demand: The distance mark'd; the men are placed; The signal falls-but not alone. Here would I pause, as loth to tell What further on that field befell. "Toddle's the word, O'Holsters-Greeney's dish'd." "Sure the boy 's ounly got the thing he wish'd: He's settled in the country, any how! " 430 A NOTICE OF GOODWOOD RACES, PAST AND PRESENT. BY LORD WILLIAM LENNOX. Ir would be a curious speculation to trace the causes of the rise, decline, and downfal of the turf, at many of the provincial meetings, but it is one that would exceed the destined limits of our article, and is of too much importance to be disposed of summarily. Suffice it to say, that cant and hypocrisy, upon one side, have done their best to bring into contempt and disrepute the whole body of our field sports. Furious and Quixotic attacks have been levelled against racing-the pulpit has been prostituted to the purpose of decrying this popular and national amusement of the people; an amusement that has, from time immemorial, received the especial support of royalty; and which is accessible alike to the peer as the peasant. Now, though we profess ourselves friends to the manly sports of "merrie England," we are the bitter enemies of any that tend to cruelty, selfishness, or brutality. We wish to see the humbler classes enjoy their leisure hours in manly sports: we like the fist better than the knife. We prefer fairs, wakes, revels, May-day games, Christmas gambols, to torch-light meetings, political associations, chartist conspiracies. We think THE SPORTING REVIEW, and "Bell's Life in London," more profitable than "The Northern Star," "Cobbett's Gridiron." There are other causes to which the decline of the Turf may be attributed, which we will not here enter into; sincerly trusting that they are but temporary, and that the sports founded by our ancestors will not degenerate in our days, and that the turf will, ere long, become as flourishing as it ever was even in its most palmy days. Of those that are on the decline, we must mention York. Until a recent period, this meeting was one of the foremost in the North of England; and at no county meeting was there a greater concentration of rank, wealth, and beauty: Alas! "York, York, thou art no more what thou hast been!" Doncaster, too, can no longer boast of the brilliant equipages of the noble families, once its patrons. Where are the Devonshires, the Fitzwilliams, the Scarboroughs, the Lambtons? Echo answers, 'Where?' Brighton, formerly the cynosure of fashion; the once favoured spot, honoured by royalty, by one whose heart was passionately devoted to a race: "Oh! what a falling off is there!" Lewes, where royalty and racing drew the people together, is now comparatively deserted ;-Lewes, the far-famed spot, where, in 1805, Mr. Mellish's b. c. Sancho, by Don Quixote, beat Lord Darlington's b. c. Pavilion, 8 st. 3lb. each, four miles, 3,000 guineas, 2,000 forfeit, with two to one against him. Guildford, spite of a Queen's Plate, has, for years, been a miserable failure, and long ceased to exist as a place of sport ;-Egham, far from what it was in its In 1805, Sancho won three matches, beating Pavilion, 3,000 guineas, and Hannibal, 1,000 guineas, and Bobtail, 200. In 1806, Sancho broke down in a 2,000 guineas' match youthful days, is now less than ordinarily attractive, spite of the exertions of a few supporters of the turf to restore it to its former prosperity;-Warwick, too, has lost ground;-Bath and Cottesford Spring Meetings have fallen sadly into decay. But enough of a graceless theme; we turn to a brighter one,-to Liverpool, which may now fairly take rank with the first meetings in the kingdom;-to Bibury, now held at Stockbridge, bidding fair to regain its popularity;-Wolverhampton, now one of the best meetings in the Midland Counties; cum multis aliis; and last, not least, to Goodwood. For some years these races had been on the decline; and so poor was the sport, and so paltry the subscriptions, owing to the falling off of the patrons of the turf, that it was even betting that the meeting would not outlive many seasons; the public money given, seldom exceeded £150; occasionally, it was a "Flemish account"-none at all! Symptons of decline, as well in the sport as the company, had shewn themselves; affairs could not possibly go on in this way. The entire ruin and downfal of the meeting must have been the inevitable consequence, when the noble owner of Goodwood, anxious to preserve a meeting founded by his ancestor, the third Duke of Richmond, in 1802, came forward, and, by his influence, restored the meeting to more than its former prosperity. And here, in giving an extract from a newspaper, published in 1802, we fervently hope we may see the latter part of its wish fulfilled in the person of the present Duke, the reviver of the sports: "The thanks of the county in general, and of Chichester and its vicinity in particular are largely due to his Grace the Duke of Richmond, for having thus munificently and liberally instituted an establishment of most material local benefit in every point of view; both as a source of pecuniary advantage to the inhabitants, and as a means of forwarding to notice, and increasing the consequence of, the western part of the county. We can only add our wish that the illustrious Duke may for many years live to enjoy, in health and happiness, a scion planted by the hand of his ancestor, but nurtured and brought to perfection by his own." To the exertions, then, of the noble owner of Goodwood, backed by a party of influential supporters of the turf, the celebrity which this meeting has now attained is entirely attributable. It has now acquired an importance that places it on a level with the best provincial races in England. Under its new auspices, the spirit of the olden time revived; the effect of the change speedily became apparent. Considerable alterations and improvements were made in the course; a new stand, capable of containing nearly three thousand persons, was erected; the turf was relaid in several places; new gallops formed, with Pavilion, at Lewes, paying, in that year, the following forfeits in matches : |