there is one spot more eminently distinguished for a general
rendezvous of fraud and gambling, that place is Newmarket.

The diversions of these plains have proved a decoy to many a
noble and ingenuous mind, caught in the snares laid to entrap

youth and inexperience. Newmarket was a wily labyrinth of loss
and gain, a fruitful field for the display of gambling abilities,

the school of the sharping crew, the academy of the Greeks, the
unfathomable gulf that absorbed princely fortunes.

The amusements of the turf were in all other places intermixed
with a variety of social diversions, which were calculated to

promote innocent mirth and gaiety. The breakfastings, the
concerts, the plays, the assemblies, attracted the circle of

female beauty, enlivened the scene, engaged the attention of
gentlemen, and thus prevented much of the evil contagion and

destruction of midnight play. But encouragement to the GAMBLER
of high and low degree was the very charter of Newmarket. Every

object that met the eye was encompassed with gambling--from the
aristocratic Rouge et Noir, Roulette, and Hazard, down to

Thimble-rig, Tossing, and Tommy Dodd. Every hour of the day and
night was beset with gambling diversified; in short, gambling

must occupy the whole man, or he was lost to the sport and spirit
of the place. The inhumanity of the cock-pit, the iniquitous

vortex of the Hazard table, employed each leisure moment from the
race, and either swallowed up the emoluments of the victorious

field, or sank the jockey still deeper in the gulf of ruin.
The common people of England have been stigmatized (and perhaps

too justly) for their love of bloody sports and cruel diversions;
cock-fighting, bull-baiting, boxing, and the crowded attendance

on executions, are but too many proofs of this sanguinary turn.
But why the imputation should lie at the door of the vulgar alone

may well be questioned; for while the star of nobility and
dignified distinction was seen to glitter at a cock-match or on a

boxing-stage, or near the 'Ring'--where its proprietor was liable
to be elbowed by their highnesses of grease and soot, and to be

hemmed in by knights of the post and canditates for Tyburn tree--
when this motley group alike were fixed in eager attention, alike

betted on and enjoyed each blood-drawing stroke of the artificial
spur, or blow of the fist well laid in--what distinction was to

be made between peer and plebeian, except in derogation of the
former?

The race-course at Newmarket always presented a rare assemblage
of grooms, gamblers, and greatness.

'See, side by side, the jockey and Sir John
Discuss the important point of six to one;

For, O my Muse! the deep-felt bliss how dear--
How great the pride to gain a jockey's ear!'[76]

[76] Wharton's Newmarket.
Newmarket fame was an object of ambition sought by the most

distinguished personages.
'Go on, brave youths, till in some future age

Whips shall become the senatorial badge;
Till England see her thronging senators

Meet all at Westminster in boots and spurs;
See the whole House with mutual phrensy mad,

Her patriots all in leathern breeches clad;
Of bets for taxes learnedly debate, And guide with equal reins

a steed or state.'[77]
[77] Ibid.

And then at the winning-post what motley confusion.
--------------------'A thousand tongues

Jabber harsh jargon from a thousand lungs.
****

Dire was the din--as when in caverns pent,
Hoarse Boreas storms and Eurus works for vent,

The aeolian brethren heave the labouring earth,
And roar with elemental strife for birth.'[78]

[78] 'The Gamblers.' Horace had said long before--Tanto cum
strepitu ludi spectantur, 'So great a noise attends the games!

The frauds and stratagems of wily craft which once passed current
at Newmarket, surpassed everything that can be imagined at the

present day. The intruding light of the morning was execrated by
the nightlygamblers. 'Grant us but to perish in the light,' was

the prayer of the warlike Ajax:--'Grant us black night for ever,'
exclaimed the gambler; and his wishes were consistent with the

place and the foul deeds perpetrated therein.[79]
[79] The principal gambling-room at Newmarket was called the

'Little Hell.'
Sit mihi fas audita loqui--sit numine vestro,

Pandere res alta terra et caligine mersas.
The turf-events of every succeeding year verify the lament of the

late Lord Derby:--
'The secession from the turf of men who have station and

character, and the accession of men who have neither, are signs
visible to the dullest apprehension. The once national sport of

horse-racing is being degraded to a trade in which it is
difficult to perceive anything either sportive or national. The

old pretence about the improvement of the breed of horses has
become a delusion, too stale for jesting.'

Nothing is more incontestable than the fact that the breed of
English horses has not been really improved, certainly not by

racing and its requirements. It has been truly observed that
'what is called the turf is merely a name for the worst kind of

gambling. The men who engage in it are as far as possible from
any ideal of sporting men. It is a grim joke, in fact, to speak

of "sport" at all in their connection. The turf to them is but a
wider and more vicious sort of tapis vert--the racing but the

rolling of the balls--the horses but animated dice. It is
difficult to name a single honest or manly instinct which is

propagated by the turf as it is, or which does not become debased
and vitiated by the association. From a public recreation the

thing has got to be a public scandal. Every year witnesses a
holocaust of great names sacrificed to the insatiable demon of

horse-racing--ancient families ruined, old historic memories
defiled at the shrine of this vulgarest and most vicious of

popular passions.'
Among those who have sought to reform the turf is Sir Joseph

Hawley, who last year succeeded in procuring the abolition of
two-year-old races before the 1st of May. He is now

endeavouring, to go much further, and has given notice of a
motion for the appointment of a committee of the Jockey Club to

consider the question of the whole condition of the turf.
There can be no doubt, that, if Sir Joseph Hawley's propositions,

as announced, be adopted, even in a modified form, they would go
to the very root of the evil, and purify the turf of the worst of

the present scandals.
It would require a volume, or perhaps many volumes, to treat of

the subject of the present chapter--the Turf, Historical, Social,
Moral; but I must now leave this topic, of such terrible national

interest, to some other conscientiouswritercapable of 'doing
justice' to the theme, in all its requirements.

CHAPTER XIII.
FORTUNE-TELLING BY CARDS (FOR LADIES).

It must be admitted that this practice--however absurd in its
object and application--does great credit to human ingenuity.

Once admitting the possibility of such conjuring, it is
impossible to deny the propriety of the reasonings deduced from

the turning up, the collocation, or the juxta-position of the
various cards, when the formalities of the peculiarshuffle and

cut required have been duly complied with by the consulter.
The cards are first shuffled ad libitum, then cut three different

times, and laid on a table, face upwards, one by one, in the form
of a circle, or more frequently nine in a row. If the conjurer

is a man he chooses one of the kings as his representative; if a
woman, she selects one of the queens. This is on the supposition

that persons are consulting for themselves; otherwise it is the