THE RACE-HORSE. 579 



now in the field, and heavily backed to lose by certain influ- 

 ential bettors, he would have no more chance to win than if 

 he had the use of only three of his legs. In the great Derby 

 stakes of 1832, in which a chestnut colt, St Giles, of no pe- 

 culiar promise, was the winner, it was believed that every 

 horse but one had been " made safe ;" and other examples 

 could be given, in which similar suspicions, whether well 

 founded or not, shew the opinion of the parties best qualified 

 to judge of the integrity of those on whom the winning or 

 losing of the race depends. Such is the condition to which 

 the English turf is reduced by confederacies of gamblers and 

 swindlers, who are able to apply their ill-gotten gains to 

 contaminate the whole body of those whom money can render 

 subservient to them. It is only within a period compara- 

 tively short that this practice of wholesale villany has arrived 

 at its full maturity of system, and that persons raised from 

 the lowest condition of life, and pursuing gambling as a 

 trade, have acquired that influence on the turf, which enables 

 them to move the inferior puppets at their will, and elbow 

 from their proper place the legitimate supporters of this an- 

 cient sport of the people. . That abuses, and grievous ones, 

 have always existed in the system, is too true ; but these 

 abuses were as dust in the balance to the heavy mass of 

 profligacy and dishonour which now weighs down the scale. 

 Foreigners will hear with wonder, that, not in the city of 

 London only, but in many of the larger provincial towns, 

 there are regular establishments, where betting proceeds as 

 systematically and constantly as the business of the Stock 

 Exchange. In one great establishment alone in London, 

 Tattersall's, L. 100,000 and more sometimes change hands 

 in a day. But this is the regular establishment for gentle- 

 men really connected with the turf. There are, however, 

 clubs or houses in the Capital, which are mere places of 

 gambling, where the parties frequently know nothing of 

 horses, except as things to make money of. Many of these 

 are a sort of low taverns, called Sporting Public-houses, fre- 



