-are matters of history. However, soon after this he won the same prize with Shengarry; but it was in 1866 that he made his mark, when he won the Liverpool with Salamander, a 50 to I outsider, with which he gave the ring such a dressing as they never forgot-the sight of Mr. Studd's colours for the future, on anything, no matter what it was, being quite sufficient to make a favourite of him. Then he had a row with the Epsom Grand Stand proprietors, to which we owe the high-level course; and then he 'took religion,' as they say in Ireland. Moody and Sankey had the credit of his conversion, which was doubtless sincere. For the last few years he may be said to have given up the world, and he passed his time in endeavours to turn others to his peculiar views.

เ

We saw in the Times' lately the death of Charles Cooper Henderson, the well-known painter of coaching and road scenes, whose pictures at the late exhibition in Bond Street were the gems of the collection. His loss is to be much regretted. It is not too much to say that what Mr. Apperley's (Nimrod's) pen did for the road, was equally well done by Mr. Henderson's brush. For spirit and truth of detail he was unrivalled, and his pictures now will have a double value and be counted as treasures in every sportsman's home.

The colours of Sir Williamson Booth have so rarely of late years been seen on the turf, that to the rising generation they are probably unknown. The news of his death, which took place after a brief illness at his seat, Paxton Park, Huntingdonshire, on the 26th ult., will recall to older racing men his winning the Cesarewitch with Artless in 1859. He never had many horses, and of late years directed his leisure more to farming and fattening stock than to sporting pursuits. He was a pretty regular exhibitor at Islington, and had his share, we believe, of prizes. For some years a Newmarket habitué, the Rutland saw him for the last time in 1873, and, if our memory serves, the last appearance of his colours was at Reading the same year on Marlow, a horse that afterwards became the property of his relative, the late Mr. Vane. Kind-hearted and hospitable, liking nothing better than to see Paxton filled with guests, he will be much missed by a large circle of friends and acquaintances.

Mr. Willian Gaskell, whose death we noticed in the last 'Van,' was a great ally of Squire Osbaldeston. During the time that the latter hunted the Pytchley country they kept house together at Pitsford, near Northampton. Upon one occasion, when out with the hounds, the Squire used very strong language to his friend, so much so that Mr. Gaskell said that he should remove his horses to Grantham. When Mr. Gaskell got back to Pitsford he found a scrap of paper upon the table with these words written upon it, If you are of the same mind as you were this morning, I suppose I had 'better not come to dinner.-G. O.' Mr. Gaskell wrote upon the back, 'If you are in the same temper as you were this morning I think you had better not.-W. G.' The Squire came to dinner nevertheless, and they were as good friends as ever.

Constantly as we all pass the Cocoa Tree, in St. James's Street, probably few of us think that it is one of the oldest clubs, or rather chocolate houses or 'coffee houses' as they were called one hundred and fifty years ago, in London. White's was, we believe, in existence then, and there were the St. James's, the Smyrna, and the British. What connection there was between the beverage and the principles we know not, but the Tory's drank chocolate, and the Whigs were addicted to coffee, and the Cocoa Tree was the headquarters of high Toryism, where they drank the health of the king over the

[September, 1877'water' oftener than they did that of King George. The Cocoa Tree became a club as far back as 1746, but it long retained and does still retain a good many of the features of the old chocolate house. Its members no longer talk treason, nor does one man win a hundred thousand from another at a sitting, as Horace Walpole records, but we believe it is a very sociable body, and it is great at billiards. The Secretary of the Cocoa Tree, Captain North Daniel, has compiled some interesting particulars respecting this relic of old days.

It has been said that English journalism is getting Americanised, that is to say that attacks on character, a prying curiosity into the details of men and women's private lives, and unblushing personalities are found to pay by journals of a high class. That the tone of journalism has changed within the last quarter of a century, it would be idle to deny, and that there are some grounds for the allegation above mentioned would be difficult to contradict. Indeed within the last fortnight, everybody who cares for the character of the English press must have been scandalised and disgusted by an article in a London weekly paper, written in the first person avowedly by the proprietor and editor, of such a nature as to throw into the shade the most scurrilous attack on private character that ever appeared in the most 'rowdy' of American newspapers. The truth or falsehood of the article in question is not the point, though, seeing the quarter from whence it emanates, we should have little difficulty in appraising it at its proper value; but that a man of a certain status, clever though unscrupulous, should have so prostituted his pen, and taken advantage of his position to pour forth a flood of vituperation on a gentleman with whom he had had a quarrel, such as Bernard Gregory in the columns of the Satirist' never used, is a slur and reflection on English journalism that seems to call for some protest. We do not think so much of the intense vulgarity of the whole affair, the bringing of a lady's name into the unseemly row, &c., because that is the writer's business, and he acts according to his lights. But when he uses a paper of which he is the responsible editor and proprietor, as a vehicle for coarse rancorous abuse of some one he hates or is hostile to, he seeks to lower the character of journalism, and to make some of the mud with which he so freely bespatters others cling to it. But we trust the world will justly judge between it and

him.

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We rarely prophesy, but are tempted to deviate from this rule, as we have received a hint from our old Kisber friend to say a good word for Plunger. So we venture to herald the son of Adventurer as the winner of the Leger of 1877.

ནཱ་༄།།

BAILY'S MONTHLY MAGAZINE

OF

SPORTS AND PASTIMES.

THE EARL OF HUNTINGDON.

THE subject of our present memoir was born in the year 1841, and is son of the 13th Earl of Huntingdon, who married Elizabeth Power, daughter of Richard Power, Esq., of Clashmore, County Waterford. He succeeded to the title on the death of his father in 1875; and is J.P. and D.L. for the County Waterford, and J.P. for the King's County.

As a boy Lord Hastings showed early signs of delicacy, owing to which cause his early education was intrusted to the hands of private tutors, he afterwards matriculating at Christ Church, Oxford."

In 1867 he married Anne Wilmot, daughter of the late Colonel the Hon. J. C. Westenra, of Sharavogue, King's County, and then returned to reside at White Church, in his native county of Waterford, where he hunted a pack of harriers for that and the following year, then changing to the pursuit of fox, and continuing to show his friends and followers admirable sport in those parts till the year 1871; Lord Waterford then hunting for one year this portion of the country in conjunction with his own, after which Sir J. Nugent Humble took the horn, and has since held the command. An opportunity now presenting itself to hunt the Ormond and King's County Hunt, Lord Hastings came to live in Sharavogue, the seat of his father-in-law, and in 1872 commenced operations in this region, where for very many years Colonel Westenra, and also his father, Lord Rossmore, had maintained their hunting establishments in that condition which placed them at the top of the Irish tree during their respective terms of office. Till 1875

he continued to hunt the Ormond and King's County countries three days a week, but he then gave the Ormond portion to Mr. William French, still continuing to hunt the King's country as a two-day-a-week country, and this he does with a lady pack,'

VOL. XXXI.-NO. 212.

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