THE OMNIBUS.

"There he sat, and, as I thought, expounding the law and the prophets, until on drawing a little nearer, I found he was only expatiating on the merits of a brown horse."-BRACEBIDGE HALL,

WAY BILL:- -Notes of the Week-The Oaks The Horse ShowAscot-The Sales-Hawick Common Races-Swimming-Bicycle Races-Mr. Robertson's Sale,

THE week between Epsom and Ascot was a remarkable one for the Turf. First came the great Two-year-old change, heralded by the State Paper from Sir Joseph Hawley and Mr. Chaplin. It seldom falls to the lot of one man to make such an able maiden-speech and to help to draw up such a clearly reasoned document within a month. Lord Derby's letter was made a great deal of, but we confess we can see very little in it. The lament over the loss of caste among Turf supporters we have had before. There was no reason why his lordship should not have voted. His connection with the Turf did not cease with Toxophilite, as he has had yearlings ever since, and sold one, if we mistake not, for 1,000 gs. He was therefore specially entitled to speak upon a question which concerned young stock. If they are the "instruments of gaming" he so deplores, why does his lordship continue to breed them, and sell them as yearlings? We can well fancy his indignation respecting the employment of touts, more especially as a noble member of the Jockey Club had been openly proclaimed in Westminster Hall as an eminent "employer of labour" in that branch of industry, but what puzzles us most is, why his lordship should have opposed that part of Sir Joseph's reform bill which enacted that twoyear-olds should divide and not run a dead heat out. It seems to stand to reason that the man who even envies the French nation its close time for two-year-olds up to August 1st, would not have opposed a clause which prevents their very hearts being cut out of them at such a tender age. When Sir Joseph gave notice of his motion the public prophesied pretty nearly with one accord that May 1st would be the day, and that this proposal to save two-year-olds was most salutary, and till they saw the Jockey Club division they could hardly believe in the defeat of the latter. We believe that the racing men will acquiesce cheerfully in the May 1st date, and we strongly doubt whether Sir Joseph, agitate as he may, will ever be able to change it. Admiral Rous did all he could on paper to set the Turf world in a rebellion on the point; but they know "the old salt" now, and don't think much of his advice when he

is heated by defeat. Still, had July 1st been the period fixed there would have been a regular row.

on

Strong permanent stakes will be formed at Newmarket, which has now the first run of the two-year-olds, and England is "not given to change" in these respects. No one sighs for any of the departed twoyear-old races except the Althorp Park Stakes. Mr. Dorling was all alive to seize the first Monday and Tuesday in May, but the Admiral was before him, and Mr. Topham had also declared his intention of keeping his old days. We shall thus have Epsom Spring on a Monday and Tuesday, and overlapping the Chester Tnesday. It is a great pity that the latter meeting does not compress itself into three days, and so fit in; but mighty is the "muzzling and guzzling interest" within those ancient walls. We should like to see the Derby permanently pushed into the first week of June and Ascot into the third. It gives more backbone to the month, and keeps the London season better together. As for the early meetings, some may depart into an unhonoured tomb, and many of her Majesty's subjects will be saved from bronchitis by their demise. For our part, we still think that there is a great deal of blood stock, and stock with "only a hair in their tail wrong," in the kingdom, which is never utilized, and that if we had good Plates for four-year-olds which have never started as two or threes, they would fill a gap and bring out horses destined for young hunters, to better purpose than if they had their ribs stuffed with linseed, and flour, and potatoes for hunter shows, till they are quite "butter fat." Hunter Stakes with their conditions which are systematically evaded, and made the subject of frauds and wrangles innumerable, have had their day. If you don't meet a Marksman you meet a Scarrington, and so it has always been since the days of old Aggravator. A time, we are persuaded, will come when the gentlemen may be proud of winning their Four-year-old St. Leger. We see that Lord Derby speaks with approval of the system of handicapping between limits of 56lbs. or 63lbs., and that the Admiral comments on it immediately after by making Knight of the Garter give 71 lbs. to a lot of those weeds, whose racing interests lie so very near to his heart of oak. We wrote of the advisability of such a system as a guard for good horses more than twenty years ago, and, oddly enough, 60lbs. was our proposed limit, or just half-way between Lord Derby's two. Still the Jockey Club at Newmarket scouted the thing altogether, when Lord Calthorpe brought it on indirectly by proposing a limit to the top weight, while Lord Coventry proposed one to the bottom one, and there was 56 lbs. between them.

If Sir Joseph was saved in spite of himself from creating a panic in the latter part of the Derby week, he made a real good one as the new one opened. Sadler seems an unlucky name. Was there not an Irishman of that name, whose body was found, and whose death the Irish refused to believe in, on the ground that he was not likely to commit suicide, but he had got another corpse the exact counterpart of himself to throw people off the scent when he left the country? It was a 1,000 to 1 against that or such an event as Pretender's nominator dying taking place before the Derby, and not being known officially before settling day. Mr. Sadler had gone to the Downs, but if anything had happened, the Doncaster papers had 30 hours to hear of it