PART II.-CHAPTER XV. 



THE RACE. 



HENRY Earle of Pembroke [1570-1601] instituted Salisbury Race;* which hath since continued 



very famous, and beneficiall to the city. He gave pounds to the corporation of Sarum to 



provide every yeare, in the first Thursday after Mid-Lent Sunday, a silver bell [see note below], of 



value; which, about 1630, was turned into a silver cup of the same value. This race is 



of two sorts : the greater, fourteen miles, beginnes at Whitesheet and ends on Harnham-hill, which 

 is very seldom runn, not once perhaps in twenty yeares. The shorter begins at a place called the 

 Start, at the end of the edge of the north downe of the farme of Broad Chalke, and ends at the 

 standing at the hare-warren, built by William Earle of Pembroke, and is four miles from the Start. 



It is certain that Peacock used to runn the four-miles course in five minutes and a little more ; and 

 Dalavill since came but little short of him. Peacock was first Sir Thomas Thynne's of Long-leate ; 

 who valued him at 1,000 pounds. Philip Earle of Pembrock gave 5li. but to have a sight of him : 

 at last his lordship had him ; I thinke by gift. Peacock was a bastard barb. He was the most 

 beautifull horse ever seen in this last age, and was as fleet as handsome. He dyed about 1650. 



" Here lies the man -whose horse did gaine 

 The bell in race on Salisbury plaine ; 

 Reader, I know not whether needs it, 

 You or your horse rather to reade it." 



At Everly is another race. Qusere, if the Earle of Abington hath not set up another ? 



Stobball-play is peculiar to North Wilts, North Gloucestershire, and a little part of Somerset near 

 Bath. They smite a ball, stuffed very hard with quills and covered with soale leather, with a stafte, 

 commonly made of withy, about 3 [feet] and a halfe long. Colerne-downe is the place so famous 

 and so frequented for stobball-playing. The turfe is very fine, and the rock (freestone) is within an 

 inch and a halfe of the surface, which gives the ball so quick a rebound. A stobball-ball is of about 

 four niches diameter, and as hard as a stone. I doe not heare that tlu's game is used anywhere in 

 England but in this part of Wiltshire and Gloucestershire adjoining. 



* [In the civic archives of Salisbury, under the date of 1585, is the following memorandum: " These two years, in March, 

 there was a race run with horses at the farthest three miles from Sarum, at the which were divers noble personages, and the Earl 

 of Cumberland won the golden bell, which was valued at 501. and better, the which earl is to bring the same again next year, 

 which he promised to do, upon his honour, to the mayor of this city." See Hatcher's History of Salisbury, p. 294. In the Ap- 

 pendix to that volume is a copy of an Indenture, made in 1654, between the Mayor and Commonalty of the city and Sir Edward 

 Baynton of Bromham, relative to the race-cup. It recites that Henry Earl of Pembroke in his lifetime gave a golden bell, to be 

 run for yearly, " at the place then used and accustomed for horse races, upon the downe or plaine leading from New Sarum towards 

 the towne of Shaston [Shaftesbury], in the county of Dorset." This would imply that the nobleman referred to was not the founder 

 of Salisbury Races. J. B.] 



