1 72 The Post and the Paddock, 



doffed his conjuring cap in Ugly Buck's year) ; and 

 that we have never read anything more spirited than 

 the now ancient verse prophecies of Vates in The 

 Life, or anything more unique in their way than the 

 Era Epistles of " Joe Muggins's Dog." The latter 

 name has become so famihar to the ears of the public, 

 that if ever an unhappy racing prophet mounts a 

 witness-box, almost the first question that is asked 

 him on cross-examination, is, whether he is or is not 

 the original " Dog." This canine fame has been 

 wafted across the Atlantic, and the younger of the 

 two writers between whom it rests, had high literary 

 homage paid him, on the strength of it, at New York, 

 and was ultimately invited to a banquet. After many 

 ups and downs, The Field has become " a great fact" 

 among sportsmen at last. The Old Sporting and 

 New Sporting Magazines, and The Sportsman, fought 

 for a series of years over the body of Nimrod ; and in 

 1839 the proprietor of the Sporting Review entered 

 the field, and ultimately bought up his three rivals. 

 Their distinct titles and covers are still retained, but 

 the matter and illustrations of all four are the same. 

 The York Herald has from time immemorial been a 

 first-rate authority on these matters ; and the Doncas- 

 ter Gazette, as in duty bound, has wrestled most vigo- 

 rously for the race rights of the burgesses, for many a 

 long year. The Chester and Worcester papers generally 

 break out in a slight rash as their meetings draw nigh, 

 but the symptoms are very mild : while the experi- 

 ment of a strictly turf paper in Nottingham completely 

 failed, and its prophet " Timothy," deserted to the 

 enemy. The prophets, as a body, suffered most in 

 1852, when the Daily News, sly and cruel cynic as it 

 was, collected, for weeks before, every Derby pro- 

 phecy, metropolitan and provincial, which it could lay 

 its hands on, and spread a complete panic among the 

 regiment (not one of whom had whispered Daniel 

 O'Rourke's name), when it charged them, quotations 



