down to the assizes per mail-the Puisne Judges content themselves with travelling as outside passengers. Let the Lord Mayor come to Westminster Hall in a wherry, instead of the state barge, and, instead of returning to Guildhall to feast the great officers of state, and ambassadors, on turtle, content himself with a chop at Dolly's.

Impressed with the deepest sentiments of loyalty, we humbly approach the Throne with our sincerest and most cordial congratulations on this auspicious event,—an event most satisfactory to all classes of Her Majesty's subjects, and conducive to the best interests of the country. In conclusion, we know no character that stands higher in this country, or that wins "more golden opinions from all men," than the English sportsman-the indulgent and liberal landlord - the benefactor of the poor and distressed-the affectionate husband; the hospitable, upright, and truly English gentleman.

In Prince Albert we hope to find a supporter of the turf, a sincere friend to "the chase, the sport of Britain's kings ;" and anticipate, ere long, seeing the poet's lines realized at Windsor :—

"The courtly train

Mount for the chase

.. heroic, noble youths,

In arts and arms renown'd, and lovely nymphs,

The fairest of this isle; in proud parade

These shine magnificent, and press around
The royal happy pair."

THE VETERINARY ART OF THE HINDUS.

A CURIOUS article under this title appeared in the " Bengal Sporting Magazine" for May last, from which we make a few extracts, not only for their singularity, but because there is really good matter to be found in them. Under the quaint clothing of Oriental metaphor, much sound sense and useful knowledge will be discovered. The paper is stated to be a translation from a treatise, in poetry, by an anonymous amateur of hippo-pathology, addressed to his friend, Murza Muchboo, of Lucknow, "the mine of humanity and courtesy." After rendering due praise to God and the Prophet, and some eulogistic lines on the noble attributes of the horse, assuring the reader that whoso has one picketed at his door, shall never know want; and that there are some knowing hands, up to a trick or two, on whom it is wise to have both eyes; he thus proceeds with his subject :—

"I will tell thee all about splents and spavins, if thou considerest my tale of any value. If the veins inside the hocks swell, the swelling is termed mooturu' (blood-spavin ?); if they are small, no harm; if large, they are hurtful.

"Examine well near those veins: if other bones protrude beyond the joint bones, doubtless know that is a spavin. Listen not to the bukbuk of the dealer: if the swelling be pointed, it causes lameness; if you buy the horse, you'll be disgusted with life: but if it be flattish, you may work him hard without harm. The wise have agreed, that to judge well of spavins is difficult.

"If the knee-joints be enlarged, flee from that horse: the reason is, that he hathzanooh.'

"When a bone protrudes on the shank-bone, the dulal call it a splent; they reckon it a trifle, for it soon gets well: but the English call it bad, for, in their opinion, one is apt to succeed another.

"If the coronets of the fore-hoofs be thickened, you must keep another horse as an assistant: if not lame, he will become so.

"That horse who has one eye white, will cause his master to weep: he is called 'tagee;' he will beggar him. Kick the seller from five to 100 times; he is very bad omened.

"If a horse has one hind-leg white, esteem him not good. This is not limited either to the right or left: he is bad; hope nothing from him. The Prophet has said he is bad- —now what dispute can there be about it?

"If there should be any discourse of the colour of horses, then say the 'koomet' (bay) is best of all; then 'khing' (white), then 'summund' (dun, with black legs); then mooshkee,' and 'gula' (black); descending to the 'gurra' (sorrel), and 'subza' (grey). The soorung' (chestnut) is not quite so good as the above; next to him comes the ' shurghu' (golden chestnut); worst of all is the punchkulegau' (piebald). There are none after these of any value.

"Should you suspect a horse to have 'kumuree' (weakness of the loins), drive him smartly up a rise; if he go up clean, he has no 'kumuree.' Or, take and tie him in a stall; sit and stay awake near him all night: if, after lying down, he gets up fair, you may take him; if the contrary, be sure give him back.

"On telling a horse's age. Incline the ear of thy heart this way :-Every horse hath six teeth above, and six below (nippers); the milk teeth are white. When the middle ones are shed, he, who had been called a colt, is termed a three-year-old; when he sheds the next two, they say he is four; when the corner teeth fall out, he is five: at that time, near the 'chowkee,' protrude two teeth, round and fine, called nesh (tushes). After that you must ascertain the age according to the decrease of the black spots in the teeth. When they are all worn away, you may, without regard to what anybody else says, put him down as mule punj' (ten off): then compare his teeth and tushes; mark the difference, and give a guess. Then look attentively at his eyes if the hairs there are much sunk, the animal is very old. When a mare has become 'mule punj,' to tell her age is very difficult.

"This is my argument, O friend! that, in administering medicine, you always attend to the size of the horse, to his constitution, to the season of the year. Balance all these, and be sure you make a marked difference between the tazee and toorkee.

"If a horse be only slightly chest-foundered, he will soon get well; but if he be confirmedly so, he does not often recover. I will tell thee how to discriminate. Put your hand on his forehead; push him back with some little force: if he back easily, then know he is not chest-foundered; he is as sound as a seal of emerald.

"If a nail should get into the foot, or the horse get pricked by a thorn, a piece of crockery, &c., and it causes lameness, then up, and stir yourself. Heat a brick as hot as can be; place several folds of cloth over that, and put it under his hoof; then throw a small quantity of water over that. This will steam the foot; and, if continued two or three days, will cure him.

"To bring hair over a wound, rub up some indigo in spittle, thoroughly, and apply for six or seven days.

"When a foal may be born, beware it fall not to the ground; move it well in a blanket. Assuredly, when it grows up, the dust of his shoes will reach the skies."

Simple and quaint as these maxims are, there are some among them that may be applied to our stable pharmacopoeia with convenience.

MY HORSES.

BY NIMROD.

(Continued from page 34.)

DURING my residence in Shropshire, I purchased, for £100, another five-year-old black horse, by Black Sultan, which proved a trump. He was bred by Mr. Croxon, banker, of Oswestry; and, although I called him Saladin, my waggish Warwickshire friends christened him "the three-legged horse," and, certainly, with some reason; for, from what cause I never could discover, he always limped with one of his hind legs, in his jog trot, but in no other pace; and, when he was turned over in his stall, lifted up the same leg nearly to his belly, although perfectly free from string-halt at every other time. In short, a sounder horse could not exist, or one that stood his work better. He won me several Hunters' Stakes, and was the one I rode on the memorable day-before spoken of by me, in relation to the speed of hounds-when the Duke of Rutland's pack ran away from every one except the late Jack Storey, on Cockspinner, who got first through a bridle gate; and when Shaw, who hunted them, confessed he was beaten two miles in twenty-two minutes! He was, likewise, the horse I produce in my Letters on Condition, as the only one I ever rode, just out of training (he was kept on in his work till November, for the Tarporley Hunt Stakes, which did not fill that year, because he was named for them); but, as a proof of its good effects on the pipes, I mention the well-known fact, of his carrying me up Mayne Hill, with the Warwickshire hounds, after having come, very best pace, over the vale from Preston Bushes, one of the prettiest covers in Warwickshire, and, jumping a gate at the top of it, whilst the rest of the field were crawling up the hill either on foot, or, at best, at a foot's pace. He was, also, the horse I sold in Leicestershire, by the recommendation of Mr. Loraine Smith, to Mr. Murray, then hunting at Melton, late master of the Perthshire foxhounds, for 260 guineas, although it was the last day of the season, and he had then eleven hunters in his stable. He is, also, the horse that went out to exercise, very fresh, after a frost, on a turnpike-road, without knee-caps, and tumbled down, and broke both his knees, owing to a partridge rising out of a ditch, under his nose, which I mention by way of a caution.

If I proceed much longer with these alsos, I shall put your readers in mind of the "cow with the crumpled horn;" so I shall conclude the history of Saladin with stating, that I had, one day, when riding him, another opportunity of measuring the speed of hounds on a few days in the year I mean with a burning scent. I found that, to enable him to live alongside of Mr. Corbet's bitches, over grass, in a straight line (by the side of a brook), and without a fence, it required him to go quite at the top of his speed for about one mile; a fact I had previously doubted.

On my return from Melton, with the Scotch laird's money in my pocket, I did not lose a chance. I purchased two young red-roan horses (brothers) of a doctor, as I passed through Hinckley, and sold them to Sir John Dashwood; and one of them found his way into Mr.

VOL. III.

Annesley's team of roans. Further particulars have escaped me; but I recollect they were very richly coloured horses, and, I suppose, I got some picking out of them.

I had, somewhere about this time, a very smart-looking chestnut horse, got by Jupiter, and all but thorough-bred, which I purchased of Richard Bradley, the great Warwickshire dealer of those days; and which I was noodle enough to match against Dick, by Buzzard, out of Fantail; Mr. Benson and myself "up." This, of course, I lost, as Lockley told me I should; but, in consequence of his clearing a rasping fence under Mr. Collier, the veterinary surgeon then residing at Ludlow, Mr. Lechmere Charlton-those being his hard-riding days-gave me 200 guineas for him, and was unfortunate with him. He got a lash in one of his eyes, in Leicestershire, which produced blindness in both; but Mr. Charlton rode him, and, I believe, won a match after he became dark. He was a high-couraged horse, rather deficient in substance in two essential points. To a rich man, however, he was worth something to look at, for the fine gloss on his skin, and other marks of condition, at all periods of the year.

The mention of having purchased this horse of Bradley, reminds me of two others I bought of him, and to one of which hangs rather a curious tale. It was a five-year gelding, by Devi Sing, and an own brother to a famous hunter then in the stable of the late Mr. Langston, of Oxfordshire; and, on the strength of that, I gave 140 guineas for him, although quite unmade as a hunter. But he had every appearance of making one-good substance, great bone, excellent legs and feet, and shewing much blood, although, as I afterwards found out, of a very queer temper, and with a badly formed mouth. Having said this, it is scarcely necessary to add, that I had some trouble with him; for, owing to his rascally temper, he was not to be trusted at any description of fence, although he could do the trick if he liked! I began, indeed, to think it would be some time before he would take one leap, which was, back again into my breeches pocket, when I was relieved from my anxiety on that point, by a very extraordinary occurrence. On my return to Stratford, one evening, from a short visit to my home, my groom thus addressed me :— "There have been two gentlemen here, this morning, looking at the horses, and one of them (who, I found, was Mr. Price, of Bryn-ypys, near Wrexham) took a fancy to Colebs (this Devi Sing gelding), and asked me if I thought you would sell him? I told him I thought you would, for I had heard you ask a gentleman 250 guineas for him," which was not true. By the down mail, the next morning, however, I received a letter from my old friend, Mr. Lloyd Williams (who accompanied Mr. Price), to say, they were both on their road to Bicester, to hunt with Mostyn, and that if I would take a good Cheshire-cheese mare, purchased from Mr. Boycott, and a very good hunter, at 100 guineas, Mr. Price would take Colebs at the sum fixed by my groom.

Now, I attribute a great portion of my success, in selling hunters, to a precaution I invariably observed, of not selling a horse as a good one, without having proved him to be, or likely to be, a good one; and it is well known that my horses were not sold for their appearancefor ugly enough, God knows, were many of them-but from their performance in the field.

I, therefore, wrote to Mr. Lloyd Williams, to say, that I could not recommend Calebs to Mr. Price, as a hunter, but that I had four other horses in my stable-amongst them, Saladin, that I had ridden two seasons, without a fall from him-which I could recommend ; and that, in a fortnight from that time, I should be at Bicester, when he might take choice of the lot. Within the time specified, I was at Bicester, and, there being no hunting fixture for the next day, the Cheshire-cheese mare and Coelebs were brought forth, myself mounted on the former, and the squire of Bryn-y-pys on the latter. The first field we entered was divided from its neighbour by a good, but fair, fence (none very small in that vale), which I requested Mr. Price would ride Colebs over. Now, had he been "Colebs in search of a wife," and upon a good hot scent, he could not have rushed more eagerly towards his object than he did towards this fence; but, when he got within a few strides of it, he turned short round, and was half the field over again before Mr. Price got a pull at him. "No go," thought I; "all the fat is in the fire." "You had better let me ride him," said I; "he knows me, but your hand is strange to him;" so, putting him over that fence, and another (Mr. Price following me on the mare); "That will do," exclaimed Mr. Price, "I see he'll make a hunter," and so would any person have said, from the masterly way in which he cleared the second fence, a very nasty place, under a tree, and double. Colebs, however, from his bad temper, and ill-formed mouth, never did make a hunter, and the last I heard of him was in Sir Watkin Williams Wynn's curricle, at the Duke of Bedford's sheepshearing.

Now, then, for the Cheshire-cheese mare. It was not long before she was seen in Warwickshire, but I have no recollection of her doing anything worthy of notice with me in the field. She was, however, a useful hunter, equal to considerable weight, and an accomplished fencer, but the one thing needful-the pace, was wanting; and that was, in those days, a sine quá non with me: but she found a mart. Being on a visit at that noble old mansion, Weston House, in its late worthy proprietor's time, the well-known Ralph Sheldon, (one of the intimate friends of the late King, and father of the gentleman of that name, who was the victim of the incendiary, Bustin, hanged at Warwick,) the amusement of the evening, after the old folks had retired to rest, was a little half-guinea commerce, which ended harmlessly enough. "What do you ask for Masquerade ?"— '—so called by me from the circumstance of Mr. Price having, a short time before, given one of the grandest masquerades, perhaps, ever given by any private individual, and said to have cost him £10,000 !-said Mr. Sheldon, as we had our chamber candles in our hands. "She is not your sort," added he, "and, I suppose, you will sell her cheap." I answered, I was not very fond of a pigeon-toed one (which she was), but she was a good hunter, and could carry weight, and that I should expect what I gave for her, namely, 100 guineas. "I'll play you three pools of commerce," said he, "for fifty pounds a pool, and, if I win two of the three, I'll take the mare for the hundred." I rubbed my head, and hesitated. Reflecting, however, that I could lose nothing, and might

*

Since writing the above, this gentleman, an excellent sportsman and horseman, has paid the debt of nature.