although not oversized. He seemed to me a likely horse for a lasting race, but somewhat deficient in those qualities which generally testify a turn of speed.

The success of William de Fortibus served as a stepping-stone for Auckland, whose reputation is fourteen pounds better than that of his stable companion; and as the one rose the other, of course, went down, the rules of betting requiring that two horses in the same stable should alternate like buckets in a well, rising and falling by turns, until at last, perhaps, both end in emptiness.

There are one or two tom-fooleries in practice at Warwick which might be "more honoured in the breach than in the observance." Why should a horse four years old in Warwick on Sunday be only three years old on the following Monday? Singularity, when it improves upon its neighbours, becomes a virtue; in any other case it is at best a folly; but in this instance it is a piece of positive absurdity which works no good, and gains no worthy end.

The WARWICK HANDICAP was won, after a good race, by Mr. Copeland's Chantilly, beating Northenden, Tamburini, and six others. Tamburini, the favourite at only 2 to 1 against him, was last all the way! So much for the glorious uncertainty of the turf.

RIDDLESWORTH.

WANDERINGS BY MANY WATERS,

BY" AN OLD GAFFER."

A NIGHT ON THEM.

"Thim's quare

"THIS will never do, Johnnie, three days and no sport-by all that's sulky, I'll wind up, cut my hiccory and walk." crathurs, your honor, thim otters, and there's a power o' thim beyant, leave alone the couple of screeching big divils about the rock." "I'll give them music to night, powder and blazes instead of moonshinehave the boat ready, I'll have no bed till they're put to sleep." "And is it with powdther your honor will frighten the bastes." "With powder and slugs, bite as well as bark, if I get the thieving poachers within range of rifle and ball." "Oh, bedad thim, and thim's quare crathurs, thim otters entirely, with lights in their tails, joined twos and twos like Philistine foxes, with a blazing brush atween their starns and be hanged to them; and it is the shot your honor would give them, alongst with the powdther." "Why, yes to be sure, and why not?" "Och, and it's thim that's quare crathurs, thim otters entirely, with lights in their tails, and a whistle in their tooth, the reptile that knows a commissioner man as well as a poacher, and dips his burning tail in the strame, when he smells one, to see the crathurs like christians, with the ould one along.shore, and a gaff on his shouldther awatching -oh yarrah, yarrah, and it's not bullets your honor would give to the

like's of them-maybe the priest or the summons would serve." "Or a little salt on their tails, eh Johnnie-never mind, never mind, help me to catch them any how, and I'll spare the lead." "Thim's quare crathurs surely, thim otters, the two of them beyant, and the rascal on the castle rock for a look-out, quare crathurs at larning entirely-to take to the nits like Christian folk, and borrow o' nights your honor's cot without lave or sarvice; bedad, but for sessions and manslaughter they desarve thim bullets-to sweep the holes with their scaring tools and make the fish as afeard of a gintliman by day, as of thim blaygards o' nights." "Never fear, Johnnie, by hook or by crook well snare them this blessed night." "With man-traps, your honor," said Johnnie significantly. 'Aye, aye, I understand, never you fear, you haven't said one word about it, and I'll never say you did-it's only thim otters we're after hunting."

Here was the ruin of all my sport plain enough, and Johnnie's exposition of it too; I had noticed that he had been somewhat profuse in damning the otters of late (the river does abound with them), but I did not penetrate into his notions of these amphibiæ, or detect that he classified them under the genus "homo." Being thus warily enlightened on the point, I forthwith took measures to capture the enemy.

Knowing pretty well the only localities capable of being fished by nets, our plans were easily laid. Not far from the scene of their operations was Otter Island, a small rocky islet, covered with brushwood, and tall timber; here, in a narrow cleft of the rock, just large enough to admit a cot, myself and Johnnie ensconsed ourselves, in an impenetrable ambush,-two others, in a second boat, were sent some six or seven hundred yards lower down, on the opposite side, themselves concealed in the thick hazels which grow to the water's edge, the boat carelessly moored to the bank. We knew that after poaching the upper water, they would run down to the lower pools, which were ree from rocks, and there make their second sweep, our object was to catch them in this passage, the course of the channel would place them between our two forces, which, at a preconcerted signal, were to push out to the chase. Fortified with naggins of the "raal potheen," like staunch temperance men, we took boldly to the water, and shortly after sunset, were patiently waiting our time at our respective stations. It is a wild drear thing, this sort of ambuscading, more especially when all around, earth, heaven, and water, combine to give a dash of perilous solemnity to your circumstances,―here we were, lurking in the rifted chasms of a rocky islet, girt around by the wide river, there was justenough of excitement to warm the blood, just enough of danger to make it worthy the name of an enterprise, just enough, and by the powers, too much of the sublime and the

A priest-a short thick stick, like a policeman's truncheon, with which the coup de grace is administered to a gaffed salmon—a sort of priestly extreme unction.

romantic in the scenery,—for here I am going off at score into heroics, instead of telling a plain thief-catcher's tale. I was aroused from my reveries by Johnnie, who, not liking so long a silence, crept alongside, and whispered, “I'm thinking your honour, another barker or so among us, would be no great harm, or may be, a double barrel atween the two iv us, it's like to be no aisy job, leave alone the bad blood atween Ned Phelan and him that's to catch him down below,-Ned's not the boy to spare the back throw, or lave his mimory ashore, in a black night like this, there's him that's gone, and was food for fishes, 'neath the rock beyant, 'twas a long reckoning, sorra's the day he crossed Ned's path, ochone, but it's the dead keep a quiet tongue in their head, and by my sowl, more blame to thim for that same." "Hist, hist, Johnnie, look yonder, you've raised poor Larry's wraith, see where it stands, under the black yew of the Castle wall." "Faith, and your honour's right for onst, 'tis Larry's ghost, sure, or thim that made him one, but see, they're coming now."

66

As he spoke a cot shot stealthily from beneath the dark shadow of the castle rock, and in answer to a low whistle was met in the midcurrent by another which pushed out from the opposite shore. "Oh, the thieving vagobones-and it's our own cot, too; see the likes of that now, to steal your honor's potatoes, and then borrow your own pot to bile them in and maybe I don't wish their foot in it-the rot. ten plank your honor knows at the stim-and that they may find soft footing and never a skimmer to bale with." "The odds are against us; we didn't bargain, Johnnie, for all four." "Divil a bit, and sure ar'nt we four able for them." Aye, able enough if we can catch or bring them to a stand; but one boat will sure escape us with my bad poling, and a battle half won had better ne'er begun; I'd sooner lose all than miss one to have the laugh against us." As we spoke the two cots under cover of a grey cloud (or linsey-wolsey night-cap, as my man called it), which was just passing the moon, glided silently into the stream, one about 200 yards before the second, just as we wished. "Never mind the first, let her go; they'll find customers below; but now, mind, hold the mid-channel; we can keep a-head or alongside there, as we please; press them on the shallows; once ground them and they've done so now for a stiff pole and sweeping paddle, and have at'em." A few strokes and we were out in the mid-water, a few yards in advance of the second boat, which we hoped to intercept, and so separate from their comrades below, by forcing them to a retrograde movement up river; but in this we were mistaken, for down, down they come like a bolt upon us, with a desperate rush to run us down as we laid athwart the stream, or make us sheer off and leave the current open for their swift escape. "I'll put her head about when they come, not an inch before, then stave them off with a shove, Johnnie, and we'll have them on the edge of the stream, and bad luck to us, then,

if we can't keep them there." Crack, smash the next instant, but our head was round with a sweep of my paddle, and Johnnie's pole well set in their bows, and with the thrust of a bullock, off he sent our enemy at a tangent clear out of the channel to the very verge of the broken rapids. The killing pace at which they bore down upon us while we purposely held our own cot steady and stationary to receive the shock, made them with their huge impetus swerve off like a glancing shot-a touch less brawny than Johnnie's would have served, but there we had them beat to the ropes, at our mercy, we thought for capture or capsize. Yet, on they struggled, away through foaming torrent and bubbling scaurs, reckless like a drunken man, and like him too, escaping a thousand dangers, which he ought not, and if sober, would not have escaped, yet on they scoured, over jagged shallows, whirling in their eddies, tossing against sunken rocks, and tilting like a shell over angry falls, unharmed, unscathed. "Divil mend their blind eyes for seeing their way, in the dark, and for making one too," said Johnnie, as we pushed along in the stream, to keep pace with them, "see the likes of that now, niver a man saw that course with his eyes open, under the blessed sunshine, and thim divils of darkness scour along as thof they knew it by heart, but the divil helps his own, and bad manners they've larnt of him this same night, never fear, we'll have 'em yet at the bend, anyhow, they must strike for the sthrame there, and we'll bother 'em down beyant,-push along, your honour, let's be first at the lep." Each saw the other's intentions, every nerve was strained for this winning post, it was their last hope. To close with, and press them on the shallows, we ourselves had left the main channel, and on the very edge of the current like them were toiling in obstructed courses, our poles quivered like reeds in our grasp, the boat groaned over the grinding bottoms, as by main strength it was forced, almost lifted, over them, neck and neck the race held on, a few yards more, and the turn was won,-it was their sole chance, and they knew it, and with desperation for hope, they dashed across, to grapple for the stream,-a shock, recoil, and in a moment blows fast and furious, were interchanged, yet not a word, only the glaring eye, and grinding teeth, told of the strife within, another moment, and we were locked in deadly gripe, striking, strangling for very life, then came the muttered curse, and the indrawn breath,-for down we were floating unguided, through foam and torrent, shipping water in floods, as our struggles tilted our gunwales into the wave, tottering like fools and madmen, in a half-sinking boat, which was hurrying down, unheeded, to the almost certain destruction of both.

"By heavens, 'tis the old man's signal," as a flash and report echoed across the water, "there's killing work below, or he'd never call that way for help."

“Och, meal-a-murder," cried Johnnie, " 'tis the ould man's throat his hands are on sure as death-'tis the long reckoning come, Ned Phelan 's

at his bloody work agin." "Cast them off, Johnnie, cast them offhands off, you clutching villain," and with a wrench and maddened blow I released myself from the grasp of my opponent, and felled him in the cot. "To the Black-weir, to the Black-weir," I shouted, and snatching up a pole, pressed both boats to the jutting reef, that midway in the river projects its black rocks above the pool. "Cast off your man, Johnnie, cast him off-and give them soft footing with your pole -the plank, the rotten plank, you mind at the sterm-scuttle 'em at the rock and leave them." But his man was too strong for him, and it was not till my pole was thrust between them that he could extricate himself, when quick as thought seizing it, with a crashing plunge sent its iron-headed shaft sheer through the rotten plank, shivering the timbers to the very bows-the rushing tide whelmed in through the yawning gap-filled-and down she sank, sullen slow, as a coffin to its grave. "Howld fast your perch there, ye murthering vagabonds," cried Johnnie to our enemies as they leapt from the sinking cot to the isolated rock beside them-" howld fast, ye screeching divils, and I wish 'twas Ned Phelan there, instid of ye, with a skirling howl for poor Larry's wake-God rest his soul-sorra a wail he got from him whin last they met, but the bloody curse and deep water for the buryin' -hould fast, I tell ye, sit aisy on your perch, and joy be wid ye, till we're back;" and there we left them on the solitary rock, clinging to its slippery sides, as wave after wave washed over it—a precarious tenure-for all around were raging, impracticable floods, which made hope helpless, and any effort to escape, destruction. Half Johnnie's blessing and valedictory address was lost upon his foes, for we were fast on our way to the rescue-shouts, yells, and cries for assistance mixing on our ears as we approached our worsted comrades, and in sore need were they of our aid. The old man was down, his body doubled over the seat of the cot, his head on the floor dabbling in blood, and Ned Phelan kneeling on his breast, with murdering fingers on his throat, strangling the life out of him—a moment more, and we had been too late. A swinging demi-volte of my quarter staff laid Ned senseless beside his intended victim, and Johnnie's fist freed Doyle from his customer, who was, to tell the truth, more than a single-handed match for him. "Start away to the lodge, Doyle, and bring a score of men with you; we'll watch these murdering villains the while, and bring, mind, a good heckle of hemp to truss their pickers and stealers.

The skirmish was over-a reinforcement from the lodge bound our prisoners-our friends on the rock, mere "tenants at will," were glad enough to relinquish their difficult station, and yield themselves up without resistance, though conscious that bonds and imprisonment awaited them. "March, gentlemen, march," and off they marched at the word, under a strong escort, to the neighbouring police quarters, where, wishing them a good night and bon repos, I turned homewards, and sore, battered, bruised, and weary, like a hero went--to bed.