CHAPTER III. 



SILK. 



•* No more shall he at Doncaster 

 Each foal and yearling pat ; 

 Or ride up Goodwood's leafy slopes^ 

 To the trial ground with Nat ; 

 No more with Kent and Marsott 

 Shall he scan each pet in form ; 

 Or view their place, as in the race 

 They sweep past, like the storm." 



IF there is any meeting which we Shadows of the 

 should love to call up with Merlin's ^^^^• 



mirror from amid the shadows of the past, we should go 

 back seventy years, and take a glance at Knavesmire. 

 The choice with us, for once, would be more for the 

 sake of the men than the horses. We would fain see 

 the Prince of Wales, in his blue-coat and tight-fitting 

 buckskins, cantering on his brown crop-eared cob up 

 to the door of the Grand Stand ; Peregrine Wentworth 

 on his grey, with Lenny Jewison, and Cade ready to 

 go to scale in the " all white" at his side ; Hutchinson 

 of Overton in a coat dark-green as his colours on the 

 lists of the day ; and Sir Charles Turner fair and 

 ruddy, as becomes the knight of the orange banner, 

 which was so soontofind its worthiest bearers inBening- 

 borough and Hambletonian. That meeting, which is 

 still marked with a white stone in Yorkshire hearts, 

 was the dawn of a new era for the Turf, which had 

 known many ups and downs since the Duke of Cum- 

 berland's executors had sold off his stud. The names 

 of " Bolton," ** Queensberry," and " Rockingham" had, 

 it is true, lent lustre to " the sport of kings," but it 



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