ifty-four seconds Sir Joseph Hawley, a Whig baronet, beats Lord Derby,
the Conservative Premier, clears 50,000 pounds, while his jockey, for
that short ride, earns as much as you or me, my good sir, may win by the
labour of many a long year. Pigeons fly off with the result. The
telegraph is at work. At the _Sunday Times_ office, about four o'clock,
the crowd is so great that you can scarce get along the street, and many
a man goes home with a heavy heart, for some are hit very hard. "This is
a bad day for all of us," says one to me, with a very long face. "I have
lost 150 pounds," says another, and he does not look like a man who could
afford to lose that sum, and the crowd disperses--some exultant--some
despairing--all of them in a reckless mood, and ready for dissipation.
The longer we stop now, the sadder shall we become. Go to
Kennington-common, if you wish to see the moral effects of the Derby.
Drop in at the places of gay resort at the West-end in the course of the
night. Go in a little while after to Bow-street, or Portugal-street.
For many a day will families mourn a visit to the Derby. I never saw so
many wives, evidently belonging to decent tradesmen, so intoxicated as I
saw on the last Derby. In the train but little intoxication was visible,
but the coming home was the dark side--a side which the admirers of what
they call our national sports are too ready to overlook, and which even
Mr. Frith has failed to paint.

The eloquent Montalembert sees in a Derby day what Virgil has described
in the fifth AEneid. The Frenchman is too complimentary, it is true.

"Undique conveniunt Teucri mixtique Sicani."

But pious AEneas sanctioned no such reckless revelry as too often is
visible on the Epsom downs. Lord Palmerston compares the Derby to the
Isthmian games; but as they were celebrated once in ten years, and were
in honour of Neptune, the resemblance is not very clear. Pulteney, a
statesman, in his day as eminent as the illustrious M.P. for Tiverton,
published in the "World" a sketch of Newmarket; but the expense and waste
of time of such places seemed to him perfectly frightful. It is well
that his lordship has been defunct this hundred and fifty years. A horse
race then was a much more sober affair than in these enlightened
days--when every head is full and every tongue vocal with mental and
moral reform.

VAUXHALL GARDENS.

Vauxhall is alive. At one time it was thought dead, and peo