In 1851, the expectation of great gains from the concourse of foreigners and provincials to the Great International Exhibition in Hyde Park induced Batty to erect a spacious wooden structure, capable of accommodating fourteen thousand persons, upon a piece of ground at Kensington, opposite the gates terminating the broad walk of the Gardens. It was opened in May as the Hippodrome, with amusements similar to those presented in the Parisian establishment of the same name, from which the company and stud were brought, under the direction of M. Soullièr. Besides slack-rope feats and the clever globe performance of Debach, there was a race in which monkeys represented the jockeys, a steeple chase by ladies, an ostrich race, a chariot race, with horses four abreast, after the manner of the ancients, and the feat of riding two horses, and driving two others at the same time, the performances concluding with one of those grand equestrian pageants, the production of which subsequently made the name of the Sangers famous, in connection with the Agricultural Hall. Fitzball wrote some half-dozen spectacular dramas for Batty during the latter’s management of Astley’s, one of the earliest of which was _The White Maiden of California_, in which an effect was introduced which elicited immense applause at every representation. The hero falls asleep in a mountain cavern, and dreams that the spirits of the Indians who have been buried there rise up from their graves around him. The departed braves, each bestriding a cream-coloured horse, rose slowly through traps, to appropriate music; and the sensation produced among the audience by their unexpected appearance was enhanced by the statue-like bearing of the men and horses, the latter being so well trained that they stood, while rising to the stage, and afterwards, as motionless as if they had been sculptured in marble. Fitzball adapted to the hippo-dramatic stage the spectacle of _Azael_, produced in 1851 at Drury Lane. At the first rehearsal, there was as much difficulty in drilling the gentlemen of the chorus into unison, to say nothing of decorum, as Ducrow had experienced at Drury Lane in instructing the small fry of the profession in the graces of elocution. There was an invocation to be chanted to the sacred bull by the priests of Isis, and the choristers, who seem to have been drawn from the stables, entered in an abrupt and disorderly manner, some booted and spurred, and carrying whips, others holding a currycomb or a wisp of hay or straw. Kneeling before the shrine, they shouted the invocation in stentorian tones, and with a total disregard of unison; and during a pause they disgusted the author still more by indulging in horse-play and vulgar ‘chaff.’