THE GOODWOOD MEETING. BY CRAVEN. The London winter and the country summer BYRON. It is during the season thus sung by the noble cynic that Goodwood races fall, thus fortunately affording "the twice two thousand" an opportunity of seeing nature before she puts off her raiment of many and bright colours for a more sober costume. The recent anniversary of the goodly festival indeed was not the most propitious for cultivating the acquaintance of the sylvan deities, for, on an average, the weather was wet and windy; nevertheless, I pity the man who could have ridden from Fareham to Chichester, or from Brighton to Carney's seat, and found all barren. I had set up my staff at the first of these places, and the scene which met my eye on my daily drive to the course was sunshine to my heart. Although approached by a coast road, the region through which it passed was one of truly rural loveliness. Golden fields waved in the wantonness of profusion; cottages, clothed with woodbine, geraniums, and myrtles, bloomed on every hand; companies of merry, rosy children made glad the welkin with their shouts and laughter; and every where was the endeavour and the reward of wholesome, cheerful industry. You sought in vain for trace of the curse entailed on those who "eat their bread by the sweat of their brow." Toil dwelt in a bosom of fragrance with well-spread board before him. It was a type of merry England-AS SHE IS-despite the mawworms who go about libelling God's Providence, and like foul and pestilent reptiles begriming the pleasant paths by which they pass. There dwelt the husbandman, cared for by his lord as a child by its mother. There flourished a peasantry-its country's pride-watched over and fostered by an aristocracy, well knowing that all conditions of men are formed to take parts in the social harmony; that the humblest are links without which the chain of order would fall asunder......." If I have a fault, it is digression," -so wrote the bard of Juan, and so feels his most lovely admirerof himself. For which cause and doings, with the fear of prolixity before his eyes (as wearisome to him who reads as to him that indites), he straightway walks into his subject. Tuesday, the 29th of July last past, put Goodwood races-as Jack Frenchman would express it" on the scene." By Olympian N Jupiter, and a glorious scene it was. There was money enough for a king's ransom (a precious deal more indeed than most sovereigns are worth); beauty enough to have fitted a mummy for the part of Romeo, or the Grand Signior; and sport enough to have made the internal spirit of one of the ancient covenanters "cut a caper." Still, with all these materials for the choosing, I scarcely know how to construct this my monument of its glory. It won't do to talk about the speculations-the odds and their change. Who will care to be told, thirty-one days after date, that Pythia was backed at 7 to 1 for the stakes, or Valerian at 4 to 1 for the cup-and that both were beaten-of course? No! let us eschew business for the nonce, and grasping our good pen, proceed in sportive strain to "shew how fields are won.' The attendance on the first day was far from good, though all the profession gathered together (which was the very way indeed to bring about such a result, a case of cause and effect); but by good in this instance I mean quantity and not quality. The races began at half-past twelve with the Craven stakes, won by Discord-once the Melody colt, about which so lately there was such a shindy. The old horse won literally in a canter. The Ham stakes-worth a power of money, upwards of twenty-one hundred pounds, brought out Mr. Gratwicke again in force-for it never rains but it pours-a proverb of intense truth as regards Goodwood. Seven out of the forty-one went, and Lady Cecilia, the worst in the odds, won a fine race by a head. A fouryear-old sweepstakes of 300 sovs. each, half forfeit, 16 subscribers, brought a fourth of the party to the post-the Devil-to-Pay being the favourite and it was said Lord George Bentinck offered to lay Col. Anson even money to a small sum that he distanced his champion. However that may have been, Col. Anson continued to pull through with Joe Lovell-though to me it seemed a horse to a hen that Best Bower had won. They had altered, among other changes, the vis-à-vis of the winning post since last year, giving it, as Jack would say, a "slew to port," so that a horse running next the chair reached it to the judge's line of sight-a length or two before one that hugged the rails on the inside. It's an expensive experiment that of engaging a colt hourly, but it's the true game for all that. One good coup pays for all. Here is a wretch like Joe Lovell winning, by a hazard as remote as drawing a capital prize in a lottery, £2400. I shall probably be excused particulars of the amateur racingall very excellent in itself, but not matter for history. The Drawing room stakes Old England won in a slovenly manner, as his custom is. He is neither attractive to the eye nor to the hope. "Handsome is that handsome does," they say: this colt does nothing prettily, but she's a dangerous customer not the less. When a horse wins all his races, or thereabouts, he has got into the knack of being first, either by good luck or some other way. The Gratwicke stakes was of course a certainty for Merry Monarch. It so fell out, that in a field of four-to which he had frightened the forty-nine subscribers -he was beaten by Col. Peel's Hersey. The first for the Derby is defeated-with an allowance of six pounds-by the last for the Oaks. What shall we say to public running as a criterion, after that? The Lavant-a great two-year-old trial-gave us another short muster of five out of thirty-one. The pace was first-rate; but Sting was too many for them at that game, albeit the distance was but half-a-mile, and "not enough for him to get on his legs." In the matter of the legs, this colt is likely to be more mischievous than any of his winter predecessors in Derby favour for many seasons. Of all the dog and cat days since the time of Deucalion, surely Wednesday-so soon as it had arrived at noon-was the worst. It poured and blew frightfully, and such a set of pleasure people I hope never again to foregather withal. All who could afford to be out of purgatory kept within the stand; the others fared as those under pressure for money always do-they wrought hard and miserably. On the terrace all was umbrellas and bedevilment-never was such eccentric rejoicing-indeed so they got on at all, the end of the industrious seemed accomplished. It may be mentioned that in the course of this amphibious afternoon, the King of the Netherlands arrived at Goodwood-never was a more characteristic season. His Majesty could not have been more appropriately put on the scene had all his national dykes attended as his suite. The amusements commenced with the Štand plate, won by The Shadow-a mare that did as much for her keep at this meeting as anything below the shafts of a cab is required to perform in the great metropolis. The Cowdray stakes, for two-year-olds and upwards, Lord George Bentinck secured with a filly of the tenderest age, Light Killie Krankie; and then came on the event of the day-the Goodwood stakes-the great market handicap. A very large field of horses had been backed for this race, and the layers round, who had not, by being on the spot, one opportunity of spoiling their books, made a good thing of it. Separately, the winner was not done upon till the day-at least by the public and so could not have hurt those who stood against her as one of Kent's lot. Out of 133 we had at the post twenty-three, at all sorts of weights from 6st. 11lbs. to 4st.-the latter ridden by a Lilliputian of the name of Treen, and the net avoirdupois of 44lbs. But starting they made Pythia favourite at 7 to 1; 8 to 1 against Lothario-a good lot at intermediate prices-and the winner at 14 to 1. Lord George Bentinck took infinite pains, at great personal inconvenience, to insure a fair start, which he accomplished as no one else could have done, and thus the game was played at equal main and chance for all parties. When the flag fell, Aristides went off full of running, clear of every thing, in the ruck behind. him being Rochester, The Laird of Cockpen, Egis, Wee Pet-and even at the distance going out, a tail established with stumps at the tip. After various change of position, when they hove in sight homeward bound, Miss Elis was leading gallantly, and rushed for the straight ground like a winter torrent. In consequence of Ægis fouling a post, some confusion was created about this time; but nothing had a chance with Lord George's filly, who came on winning hand over hand, finally by half a dozen lengths: Roderic being second and Lothario third, and no other placed. The running shews how well founded was the high opinion the stable had formed of this |