OTHER SEATS OF HORSE-RACING. 35 



brief notice of such of the classic horse-racing 

 resorts as are endowed with a history, such as 

 Chester, York, Doncaster, Ascot, Goodwood, and 

 Epsom. The meetings which take place at San- 

 down and Kempton Parks I leave to be dealt with 

 by other historians. 



II. 



To Chester must be awarded the merit 

 of having first established regular meetings. 

 Racing sport at that place has been traced back 

 to the year 15 11, since which 380 years have 

 elapsed, and the races at Chester still flourish ; the 

 theatre of the annual sports being, as at the time 

 indicated, the Rood Dee, which had always been 

 the arena in which the Chester people displayed 

 their powers. It was there where they contested 

 the palm in archery, pedestrianism, wrestling, and 

 similar sports, and also the place where they 

 exhibited their skill in mimic warfare. 



Although for nearly a hundred years racing of 

 a kind took place between the walls of the city on 

 one side, and the river on the other, it was not 

 till 1609 that racing at Chester came to be 

 organised in something like the shape of the racing 

 contests of to-day. The first prizes given appear 

 to have been a bell and a bowl, to be run for on 

 St. George's Day ; the donor of those gifts was the 

 sheriff of the city, and the trophies were presented 

 with much civic pomp and pretence. Trifling now- 

 adays seem such gifts in the face of the thou- 

 sands of pounds of added money, and the 

 sideboard pieces of silver and gold which signalise 

 many of the race-meetings of to-day throughout 

 the three kingdoms. 



D 2 



