shinplasters-from him upon that race, and the false wretch refused to fork up. [Between you and ine, that was the reason I came down upon him in that " Quosque-TANDEM" style so fulguriously. I rather used him up there. If Pluto will let him come out, I'll go the same team against him again. But he must plank the cash.] Pignus deponere, and then back out or forget the name of the horse you bet on, and refuse to let the stake-holder pay over-that's almost as bad as going-through a friend-against your own nag-call him—` Deafaway—and hammering a tack into his hip bone on the morning he is to start, and swearing at your trainer for letting the nails fall out of his shoes upon the stable floor. Pax, equi perceleririssimi, Westlei Ricardi ultima amplisimæque structuræ bombarda, arundo, hami que fausti, et, maxime, amica sincera et alma, tecum. P.S. I have enclosed the documents, I speak of, to my friend, J. Cypress, Jr., to translate for you. He knows my "p's" and "q's," and I don't want my hand to get familiar with your devils. P.P.S. Your Spirit comes here very irregularly. I wish you would write a letter to the C. and Enquirer, and blow up Amos Kendall, that Loco Foco postmaster. Pretty loco-not to know better our locus in quo. If existing contracts go on much more, I shall abandon all hopes of your ever getting a permanent foothold on Elysian Turf.* Cato sends his best respects. If you see Colonel Johnson, tell him I've got a new white hat that I want to bet on against any trifle that he will run against its fly in a thunder-squall. Why don't he bring out something? Are American horses good for nothing but to make smoked beef for soldiers in Florida?-Pax, again, tecum, et tuo Spiritu. Sing now this. * Amos has since resigned.-ED. "Hast thou beheld, when from the goal they start, And now alow and now aloft they fly, As borne thro' air, and seem to touch the sky; Spurned and cast backward on the followers' eyes; Such is the love of praise, and honorable thirst." THE LUPERCAL WAS PAST. The solemn priests, with vestals bearing torches-fed from the flame that burned young Romulus a king, swift rushing from a lupine mother— majestic, paced the stones of Rome, that sang beneath their glad retiracy, and, thirsty, sought the secret places of their temples. "We've had enough of such revivals," now quoth youthful Curtius, descendant he direct-so his blood showed forth, rich swelling in his neck veins-from him who leaped his horse into that horrid gulf to save his country, filling the gaping ditch, not with his body juvenile, but with his glowing soul. Deep from his mother's breast, and pure, he sucked the essence of the noble soul of daring Scævola. Mutius she called him, as she staunched the crimson glory of his severed arm, the hand cut off to throw into the teeth of a besieger of the walls that held his Love. Mount Palatine, Tarpeian Hill, Curia Hostilia, Esquiline Place, Aventine Row, Viminal Square, and all the other building lots laid out for private use at public expense, from Battery to Tauri Caput, exjected their eye-rubbing sun-rivals. Apollo laid the string on, and whipped his steamy dawn-dancers into foam, so that he might see the race, and hold back Sol at least two heats, and then have time to cool an easy jog by nightfall, and light fierce Peleus down to the barnacled bedchamber of expecting Thetis. "Forum boarium "-Fly-market,-" Forum piscarium' Catharine-slip,—all punctured mutton, and flounders fast decaying-smiling in death, like Patience on a monument, in hope long lingering, for a Five-point bidder-threw out their tainted stock, and in the dock most merciful, full fed the doubtful eels. No proud Basilica contained a solitary dandy, in a new coat unpaid for, strutting. No safe Comitium, with threatened vengeance of "contempt of court," held a pert lawyer, boring the sick Subsellia. No Rostrum breasted out the figure-head of orators. No bullock died, no dove was sacrificed with riteful ceremonies. The fanes, altars, temples all, and theatres were silent. The sacred groves let loose their grasshoppers. Glad pedagogues discharged their scholars alphabetic, and horse-hide flogged, in extacies, preferred to joy of human flesh-cuts. Plebeians, patrons, orators, patricians, knights, poets, freedmen, loafers, and logicians, homeborn, Gallician, British slaves, and Afric-the city Prætor, the newly appointed sub-treasury Quæstor, the tribunes of "the people"-office seekers-and of the seven-hilled tyrant every scrub shoemaker was afoot, and for the stadium panting. It was a race-day, and notes were not protested. Every body rose before daylight to be happy. Two capiases only were issued to the Sheriff during twenty-four hours. Both of these, however, were in actions on the case for felonious insinuation by German liberti in paying bills of a fraudulent banking incorporation, which Cataline had dinnered and suppered and drunk through the Senate for the amount of their by-bets as to who would take the lead. They were held to bail. I would rather be a bale of cotton, and walked over by all the niggers in Louisiana, than to be handled and footed as they were after the go was done▬▬ "On sharp-cut rails their ragged corduroy sat, The conscious chesnut smoking with their fat." The ladies' stand was gemmed with pearls and brilliants, early. Brightly Metella sparkled, lip-love full. Gently, with languid goodness, fainting, repulsing, seemingly, with half. forgiving, half-inviting eye-lashes, that fanned the air into a poisonous deliciousness of agony, as it blew death of Love, and love of Death, upon the unaccustomed eye-ball of the longlocked, yellow-curled Ascanius in the next box-who dared to bet a pair of gloves against her-sat, shone, killed-O! sweetest murder!-the terrible Lucretia ;- omnipotent in Beauty, cruel Victress! gentle Tyrant! merciless happiness! wearing Grief in one pitying ear, Heaven haughty in the other!-rings-rings-Lorenzo ;-everlasting circles of mad idolatry, half hidden by careless tresses ;-no other jewel showing but a breast-bound ruby, that swelled out upon her partly-by accident-unkerchiefed bosom, in the excitement of the race ;-nothing much-a strawberry-a rosebud. Proud was the eye that on her bust might look and blench not. He might gaze into the sun by summer noonday-Eagle challenger. Such was a Roman's daughter-Woman and Goddess mixed. Is the blood all lost? Are there no Deities whom we of modern years may love and worship too. Is it all * The eternal city gasped with hot anxiety. Not a newspaper was published on that morn, except the "Bona Dea Ob * I can't make this sentence out; Cicero must come up and explain himself.-J. C. Jr. server." The ode to Hiero, done into smooth Iambics by the club laureate, was in the mouths of all, excluding thoughts of trade in sugar and tobacco.* The laticlavium ruffled its broad * Pindar, the best poet in the world-whom Horace calls "inimitable" -wrote his poems in praise of swift horses, and victorious riders. Hiero was a king, and a gentleman, but he was not too proud to ride his own matches. The first Olympic is addressed to him as a horseback-man, the second to him as a charioteer. Quinctilian goes the craziest nonsense about the Poet's Union-Olympic-Beacon-Pythian-Camden-Nemean-and Trenton-Isthmian-course outpourings. Some of them are fair, that's a fact. But I can't find the time set down in a single report. Time, or no time, however, it would make some of our nags grit their teeth, to read the odes in the original Greek. One principal reason why our turf is so quiet, so deathlike, is that the club don't elect a poet laureate, and people are ashamed, or dare not, mount their own steeds.-The only exceptions are in the cases of an English steeple-chase, and an Irish fox-hunt.-Let somebody come out with something in the style of 66 Quadrupedante putrem sonitu quatit ungula campum❞ and the very dust upon the track will turn into India Rubber, and pitch the horses onward, as though Burns' witches were after them. Then, then we might be able to come home and say "There was mounting 'mong boys of the Netherby clan Fosters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and they ran ;" and remember how bright and brave was the gallant cavalier who so gracefully reined back his curving charger, before the admiring ladies, up to taw, in front of the Judges' Stand. Now, instead of a chivalrous knight willing to do to death for the cross that hangs upon his ladye-love's forehead, we look upon the ghastly face of some pale boy, consumptive, blanket-sweated, to bring him down to weight; or upon the black eye-vory, and the white ivory of an Abyssinian baboon licked into the shape of humanity, and pivotted with tiny feet upon the back of a steed who neighs for a master. What pretty execution would that babe do against helinet, cuirass and slashing battle-axe! Knighthood! horsemanship! Bring up your horses! That's a good cry, and enables one to say a thing or two in favor of modern racing. It sounds like that " Quadrupedante" sentence I just now quoted from Virgil. I heard it when Eclipse lost the first heat, and a man mounted him. I knew that Purdy would win. I saw his eye. It was like a conqueror's. I saw his seat. It was firm as Roman cement ten years old. He was glued to the saddle. He was part of the horse. I saw a centaur that once. His legs added two ribs to the glorious steed, but were adopted and formed a happy strengthening plaster to the whole family circle. His left hand felt the bit, and Eclipse looked back. His eyes, at a glance, told him there was no mistake about that feel. Then there walked up to the starting post, a dignified, fleet, and certain nag, as ever retrieved begun defeat, |