1891 A BRIEF REVIEW 319 



pose of pointing out that they testify to a terrible 

 weakness of the knees on the part of the Jockey Club, 

 which, having in this year 1844, and in the next year 

 1845 (on account of what was called the ' Old England 

 conspiracy,' for the ' nobbling ' and even cruelly 

 ' maiming ' a horse called Old England, which was 

 expected to win the Derby), ' warned off ' certain mis- 

 creants for about as heinous offences as anybody could 

 conceive, by the year 1847 had relented and restored 

 to the scoundrels, or to the most dangerous of them, 

 the privileges which had been removed either right- 

 eously (as appears from the Jockey Club's own account) 

 or unrighteously. If unrighteously (which is not to 

 be thought for a moment) a handsome apology should, 

 of course, have accompanied the public notice of the 

 restoration of privileges, or at any rate a dignified ex- 

 planation. It is that Gallio-like method of treating 

 great offences, combined with a more Draconic mode 

 of procedure against small offenders, which has caused 

 a doubt sometimes whether the Jockey Club is morally 

 sound at the core. 



In 1845 the Jockey Club passed that Kule which 

 was enough to make ' Old Q. 5 and the earliest members 

 of the Club turn in their graves : ' that no races for 

 gentlemen riders be allowed at Newmarket during the 

 regular meetings, without the sanction of the Stewards, 

 and that, in the event of such sanction being obtained, 

 these races be the first or last of the day.' Hence- 

 forth the name ' Jockey Club ' became a misnomer, 



