If a foreigner would have a comprehensive view of our system of English society all at one glance, let him go into the yard at Tattersall’s any crowded “comparing day,” before one of our great events on the turf. There will he see, in its highest perfection, the apparent anomaly of aristocratic opinions and democratic habits, the social contradiction by which the peer reconciles his familiarity with the Leg, and his _hauteur_ towards those almost his equals in rank, who do not happen to be “of his own set.” There he may behold Privy Councillors rubbing shoulders with convicted swindlers, noblemen of unstained lineage, themselves the “mirror of honour,” passing their jests for the time, on terms of the most perfect equality, with individuals whose only merit is success; and that indescribable immunity some persons are allowed to enjoy, by which, according to the proverb, “one man is entitled to steal a horse, when another may not even look at a halter.” But this apparent equality can only flourish in the stifling atmosphere of the ring, or the free breezes of Newmarket Heath. Directly the book is shut my lord is a very different man, and Tom This or Dick That would find it another story altogether were he to expect the same familiarity in the county-rooms or the hunting-field which he has enjoyed in that vortex of speculation, where, after all, he merely represents a “given quantity,” as a layer of the odds, and where his money is as good as another man’s, or, at least, is so considered. Nay, the very crossing which divides Grosvenor Place from the Park is a line of demarcation quite sufficient to convert the knowing, off-hand nod of our lordly speculator into the stiff, cold bow and studiously polite greeting of the “Grand Seigneur.” Verily, would-be gentlemen, who take to racing as a means of “getting into society,” must often find themselves grievously deceived. But Lord Mount Helicon is in the thick of it. Tattersall greets him with that respectful air which his good taste never permits him to lay aside, whether he is discussing a matter of thousands with Sir Peter Plenipo, or arranging the sale of a forty-pound hack for an ensign in the Guards; therefore is he himself respected by all. “_You_ should have bought two of the yearlings, my lord,” says he, in his quiet, pleasant voice; “Colonel Cavesson never sent us up such a lot in his life before.” “Ha! Mount!” exclaims Lord Middle Mile, with a hearty smack on his friend’s shoulders, “the very man I wanted to see,” and straightway he draws him aside, and plunges into an earnest conversation, in which, ever and anon, the whispered words--“Carry the weight,” “Stay the distance,” and “Stand _a cracker_ on Sennacherib,” are distinctly audible.