It was the Duke of Cumberland, William, uncle to George III., who instituted the Ascot Meeting, more than a century and a half ago. The first reliable notice of racing at this Royal seat of sport gives 1727 as the year of commencement, when two prizes were contended for, the larger being of the value of forty guineas, the other ten guineas less than that sum. In the following year one race also of the value of forty-two pounds took place. For some years afterwards the racing at Ascot was of an intermittent sort, as no sport took place in the years 1729, 1731-4, nor yet in the years 1737-8, nor in 1740-3. A Yeoman Pricker's Plate of £50, for hunters only, was instituted in 1744, and, twenty-five years later, namely, in 1769, the Members and Corporation of Windsor each subscribed £50 to be raced for. The Duke took immense interest in the sport at Ascot, which, in its earlier days, was of a somewhat primitive kind, as were the surroundings vastly different in every way from what they are to-day. "A memory has been kept up" of some races contested on the Royal ground, more particularly of one race, the Oatlands Stakes, run on the 28th of June, 1791, when it was said a hundred thousand pounds changed hands. The victorious horse on the occasion was the Prince of Wales's Baronet, which won the race from eighteen competitors. There were forty-one subscribers of a hundred guineas each, half forfeit, and the value of the stakes to the owner of the winning horse was 2,950 gs. The race is said to have been witnessed by about 40,000 persons; but order was so badly maintained that the venue of the race was shifted in the next year to Newmarket, where the Oatlands Stakes was run for in April, the money value involved being 3,725 gs., a large sum for those days. During the close of the last century, Ascot races enjoyed immense popularity; they lasted for a week, and afforded a fund of amusement to all who witnessed them. They were beloved of the King--"the good old King George III."--who, for a number of years, never missed being present. He was, at any rate, never absent when the hundred guineas was run for, which he gave for horses that had been out with the stag-hounds.