BLOOD SIRES. 211 



Stockwell, you were beckoned forthwith behind the 

 glass doors of his sanctum, and there you sat, with 

 the nuttiest of sherry and the most venerable of port 

 a 4 ; your elbow, and heard of Whalebone, the little 

 " Whalebone weed " (Spaniel), who was bought for 

 150 over the Petworth dinner- tale, and won the 

 Derby, with Mameluke, Loutherbourg, and ft all the 

 coltish chronicle," by the hour. 



Dr. Bellyse, of Audlem, whose love of handicapping 

 and cock-fighting was so infinitely in advance of that 

 which he entertained for his pestle and mortar, that 

 it used to be said he never would attend any case 

 during Chester races, was an equally remarkable 

 turf character, though on the whole he preferred 

 the cock-pit to the race-course. It was his cardinal 

 doctrine that the most incestuous eggs produced the 

 strongest fowls; and so jealous was he of his breed, 

 that when one of his noted " crow-alleys" was sitting 

 on a nest of such eggs, and a great cock-fighting 

 nobleman offered him a fifty-pound note for her, he 

 lifted her off the nest, then and there, and broke all 

 the eggs, " Why, sir ! you sold me the eggs as well 

 for the 50," was the indignant remonstrance ; and 

 " No, indeed, my lord, I didn't ; I should have asked 

 you a thousand for her and the nest," was the only 

 rejoinder. To show how this daintiness about breed 

 may be set at naught, we may call to mind how, 

 after the memorable cocking match at Melton, which 

 ended in a tie, one of the parties was actually so bare 

 of birds, that he gave a lad 10 guineas to scour the 

 country, and out of the eleven cocks that fortunate 

 youth collected, no less than eight won their battles. - 

 The Doctor's abstract faith in man was not great, as 

 he was occasionally heard to say to one of his 

 " feeders " : " I'll just tell you what it is, if you 

 thought you had one ounce of honest flesh in you, 

 you'd run straight away to a surgeon, and get it cut 

 out." 



p 2 



