'locks,' scorning the barren past, and impatient of a fruitful

future

'I'm owre young, I'm owre young to tak' me from my mammie yet ;

But if ye come this gate again

I'll aulder be gin simmer, sir.'

'And that's a thruth, by the holy mass,' says Pathrick; so on this ' blessid opportunity 'av 1869, Widow Mulligan, Cushla Macree,' 'Let us dance like divils till morning,

And rowl to bed dead drunk with whisky.'

Now Tom of Lincoln, swinging out with an echo that should reach the grass grounds of Leicestershire and the Vale of Belvoir in the far distance, clangs away with his resonant and joyful voice. De

functos ploro.'-Ta-ta, '68-good-bye, old fellow-going-goneand away you must when Old Nick drives, and he is at my side this very instant, looking over the fens of Lincolnshire. Pestem fugo.' I forbid blank days in spite of the vagabond of Cole Overton: well, said, Tommy: Festa decoro,' away, away! forty minutes, best pace, up wind, with a good start from Ranksborough Gorse. Who would desire a more jubilant festival after a baptism in the Whissendnie ? Is it not an advantage to have been at Eton with Ben Drury, and to have learnt the knack of construing Latin with the freedom of a Gladstone Spoliation Bill?

Throughout Europe, let it be said the world, from the first day of the mistletoe to Twelfth Night, reigns the Lord of Misrule, varying in his festivities according to the taste and genius of the people. In China it is the Feast of Lanthorns,-where Tsin-pater surrounds himself with materfamilias and her pledges, and invites his friends to feast with him in a huge lanthorn of thirty-five feet diameter, constructed for the occasion, resplendent in rainbow colours, and with a hospitable board profusely supplied with bird-nest soup, dogs 'en sauce poivrade,' and cats en rissolles.' But a stray spark will occasionally ignite the varnished fabric, during the jollification with the forbidden opium, and then there is lamentation and a fricandeau of Tsin piqué. In India, the dutiful son carries his dying parent to the banks of the Ganges, places him within reach of the rising river, and leaves him to be washed away by the holy stream on this fortunate day, whereby the venerable father becomes assured of eternal bliss. How filial! In antagonism to the water of the unbelieving Pagan, the believing Christian appeals to fire, and in Rome and Spain heretofore roasted his heretic, and would again if he dared, on this Catholic holiday, so that his soul might be purified from the crimson sin of free thought. In complimentary accord with the Roman Pontiff, the King of Dahomey, at this festival in Africa, sacrifices his prisoners in a communion of bloodshed.

'Le jour de l'an!'

'Gai! gai chantons amis,

De ce qui se passe à minuit dans Paris-gai! gai!'

But that is the province of What's What.

The Boulevards teem

with etrennes. From the Emperor to the gamin, from the jewelled bracelet to the simple ring of gold, the offerings come in profusion, borne by the lacqueys of aristocratic wealth to the respective altars of incense, or carried, propria persona, in a more humble guise en sabot, to receive a beaming smile and a sweet salute. Mais oui'c'est de tout cœur-c'est ça.' Madame la Duchesse-la Grisette 'fraiche et appetissante,' has the best of the bargain.

The icicled city of the Tsar demands a potent concoction to effect an interior thaw. Be that as it may, on paying the New Year's visit it is correct that, underneath the multitudinous wraps of fur, one should be clad in summer costume, out of compliment to the lady of the palace, in order to signify that her saloons have all the geniality of southern latitudes. This etrenne is at times expensive, and is not paid for in roubles or jewels,—but by the loss of the tip of a frostbitten nose, or a finger, or eke a toe, or of any other prominent morsel of more or less value in physics.-'Le jeu ne vaut pas la chandelle '— eh? And now we are truly in the sunny south, the lusinghiera Partenope,' in the region of maccaroni, where on the shore of the Chiaja, or at Santa Lucia, the Lazzarone revels in company of Arlecchino and Pulcinello. Viva Bacco e viva amore, l'uno e ' l'altro ci consola.' Let us pass by Rome-quick. The Pope and Antonelli usually provide one or two soggetti' for the guillotine at the Porta del Popolo, to inaugurate the New Year and to make it lively according to the benign notions of him of the Fisherman's ring. Via. Beautiful Florence!-Yes, Arno wins us to the fair white walls 'of the Etrurian Athens,' where' Plenty leaps to laughing life: Gay bands of singers go from house to house singing, as Italians only can sing, the popular melodies of the 'gran maestro Gioacchino Rossini, at whose obsequies, so lately performed, the mourning spirit of Mozart's Requiem mingled with that of his own incomparable Stabat Mater. On the Lung' Arno appear the first signs of the coming Carnival, with its masks and revelries, that are fast disappearing before the sager proprieties of a more masculine and deserving Italy. Wherewithal with their becoming advance in patriotic policies they still can prefer just claim to the eulogy of the Rossinian quatrain—

'L'Italiani sono cortesi
Fatti sono per farsi amar.'

Leaving the marble palaces of the Medici, styled historically "The 'Fathers of their Country,' whose New Year gifts alike to wives. and concubines were the bowl, the dagger, and the noose, wend we northward to the Teuton homesteads, where sour kraut is manufactured after a fashion that shall be nameless, and where, by other peculiarities, the doughty Saxon obtained from Petrarch the appellation of 'la Tedesca rabbia.' But the Christmas-tree of that ilk, with its pendent appendages of glittering trifles, is pleasing to the sight, and yet more so are the happy faces of children devouring, with eager eyes, those tantalizing bon-bons, in anticipation of a coveted posses

sion,

Take it, kindlein-it is wrapped in silver paper, whereon

is written a wise saw. Ay, throw it away; it is all bosh, is it not? and let the bon-bon go slobbering down by the via Appia into the stomach, where to-morrow there shall be griping and gnashing of bowels. Yea, as the child is, so is the man Teuton-ever greedy, gothic, and greasy.

Farther North still, and we are once more in merrie England, on this New Year's Day, 1869. God save the Queen !-not the crownless one of an unfaithful democrat,-but a Majesty 'de jure et de facto,' reigning over loyal hearts as over sea and land. All happiness, health and wealth, long to live, to the best and kindliest Sovereign that ever sat upon the throne of England-God save the Queen! Lo! the wassail bowl is steaming graciously and savourily, whilst around are the bright garlands of Christmas with the mistletoe in the proper place. Where is that? it may be pertinent to ask-is it ever out of place? At York,' says an ancient author, quoted by Brand in his Popular Antiquities,' they carried the mistletoe to the high altar of the Cathedral, and proclaimed a public and universal < liberty, pardon, and freedom, to all sorts of inferior and even ' wicked people.' And as these wicked people did under the mistletoe, in the Cathedral of York, receiving plenary indulgence therefor, let it be said to the readers of Baily' all round the Wrekin, Go ye and do likewise. Give us the Hayne bowl. A merry Christmas and a happy New Year,-e Viva!

'For men may come, and men may go,
But years go on for ever.'

BRITISH SPORTS AND PASTIMES.*

BY THE GENTLEMAN IN BLACK.'

THERE is one person of considerable repute who has not scrupled to speak his mind in defiance of what we will call the national prejudice on the subject of manly exercise. That gentleman is the Lord Rector of Aberdeen. He has stated that Athletics have now 'assumed the dimensions of a national calamity;' and although we cannot go with him the whole length of his assertion, it really leaves in the mind much food for consideration whether we have not sacrificed something of our dignity to the pleasure of a very ephemeral notoriety. We should like to steer clear of the Lord Rector, holding, as we do, very orthodox notions on the benefits which are derived to Englishmen from the cultivation of sport; but we shall think twice before we endorse the modern suggestion that all games, exercises, and British pastimes are essential to our well-being, and that rowing and cricket are suggestive of the highest intelligence, or Alpine climbing of poetical cultivation.

But we ought not to confound under one name things that are so essentially different as sports, games, and athletics. Partaking each

*Edited by Anthony Trollope. Virtue & Co., 26, Ivy Lane.

of a character which is always honoured in this country, and included necessarily under the head of pastimes or recreation, we would willingly defend or attack them en masse, but for the fact that our respect for each is widely different in kind and in extent. Nor can we imagine the indiscriminating stomach which pretends to digest the strong meats of racing, hunting, shooting, or cricket, with the properties which have made men famous at Copenhagen Fields or Beaufort House; unless, indeed, it be upon the principle that strong meat is none the worse for being accompanied by vegetable fare.

Sport, without respect to its etymology, has always been regarded in this country as a pastime in which man's intelligence has called in as his accessory the beasts of the field." Games vary

materially from one another. There are games of physical skill, as cricket and billiards; others are mere sedentary recreations, as chess and whist - differing, indeed, in their requirements from rouge et noir and blind hookey, but none the less games in the sense of recreation. Rowing, like athletics, is a manly exercise, and yachting is a gentlemanly amusement, demanding personal skill, or getting on equally well without it under the superintendence of a sailing-master and a steward. Where shall we put Alpine climbing, but in a category which, whatever its shortcomings, has the charm of belonging to those feats in which courage and endurance play a most conspicuous part.

We are well-nigh tired of the Olympic games. We hear of little else from those who apparently knew but little about them; and the names of Pindar and Pausanias are made to do duty for those who have few arguments of their own to adduce in support of their theories or assertions. It seldom occurs to those writers who are always drawing comparisons between Beaufort House and the 'pentathlum' or 'quinquertium,' that the athletes of the most civilized of ancient peoples were the exact reverse of our own. They were the professional runners, throwers, and wrestlers, while the amateur element went by the name of agonista,' or competitors. To the victors were assigned indeed certain privileges and pecuniary advantages, among which was a freedom from taxation, clearly pointing to a pleasure which we do not enjoy, that of dipping their hands into the pockets of Government instead of into those of their friends. This should be of value to the Lord Rector of Aberdeen and his followers, as well as the fact that the arena exhibited a contest at least as intellectual as it was physical. We doubt, however, whether modern competition would be willing to exchange its pewter pots and gay attire for the pura naturalia and barren honour of the Kóτivos, or wild olive of the classic conqueror. With all our love for field sports and our admiration of their votaries, it seems difficult to regard them excepting in their proper ephemeral light. A heavy book on a subject manifestly better treated in sparkling articles in a serial is a terrible infliction. scarcely stand in need of the wearisome repetitions of Messrs. Apperly or Carlton. Every week gives us the information we

We

require on the race meetings in the various parts of the kingdom; and it should be reserved for pages devoted to sport, and sport only, to enter into prolonged discussions on subjects with which outsiders can be but imperfectly acquainted. Mr. Trollope and his confrères have done their parts well, and Messrs. Virtue have presented the public with a book which is, at all events, a fair specimen of easy treatment of hackneyed subjects.

As it seems that racing, by common consent, is our national sport, we only ask, Where shall we begin? The Arab is well-nigh done up, and has become paradoxically slow, combining, as he does, pace and endurance. Besides this, we are none of us in accord on the Arab theory. Something undoubtedly we want, not for the racecourse, which can take care of itself, but for ourselves. We want in our ordinary high-class hacks, hunters, and carriage-horses, that sublime combination of blood and bone, of quality and substance, which does not keep pace with the demand for it. We want it, too, at a more moderate price. Like the bread we eat, we should like to have the present fourpenny loaf at twopence; and our racing system is not going the right way to supply the article. We cannot do without the thoroughbred horse, and we cannot have him without the race-course. The well-being of the Turf therefore is every man's business. Hinc illæ lachrymæ !

When we get back to the question of a new infusion of Arab blood, we are asked too frequently to depend upon imperfect information. We hear much of the Imaum of Muscat and his presents, which came from India or Persia; of the Darley and Godolphin blood, which was not Arabian, but Barb; of the regions called Nejd, as the land of a horse unequalled in beauty, strength, pace, and endurance, even on Newmarket Heath, and almost unattainable by price. Did the Muscat prince cajole the English one? and have we really not yet had a first-class Arabian in our country? The worst of these questions is that we have no competent authority to answer them. The gentlemen who have been into Central Arabia are excellent travellers, but are they equally good judges of a horse? If they were credited by the majority of racing men, or breeders of high-class horses, would no one have been found with sufficient spirit and money to have become the purchaser of at least one or two of these priceless animals? We should like Admiral Rous's opinion upon the question, independently of Abd-el-Kader; but the halls of Westminster have fewer terrors for him than the sands of the Great Desert. Besides all this, is it certain that no care and assiduity nearer home will supply a want the existence of which we are fain to admit ?

The race-course has a great public duty to perform which it utterly ignores, and a private one to which all its energies are directed. When racing men talk about their private property, and their rights, they forget the share the nation has in all public services, and in its own reputation; setting aside the mere pecuniary interest which pervades every Meeting, and which exercises a vast influence