Such was the tenor of Mr. Guyon's concluding reflections as Mr. Stallbrass turned the spanking chestnuts, who had spanked so much all the way from town as to be covered with foam and lather, into the muddy lane leading to the raceground, which was already lined on either side with crowds of countrymen and village loafers, gathered together to gape and chaff in that blunderheaded manner so pleasant to the English rustic. There were plenty of drags both before and behind them, and Mr. Stallbrass--who affected the coachman whenever he had the reins in his hand--was perpetually jerking his little finger into the air, or waving his whip in answer to recognitions, feeling all the time thoroughly happy at being seen in the company of such an unmistakable and well-known "West-end nob" as Mr. Guyon. Paying the entrance-fee, they turned up through a gate on to the turf; no sooner had they reached which than Mr. Stallbrass had a new excitement, and a new triumph, for the Hon. William Trafford, known as "Tit Trafford" from his love of horse-flesh, ranging up alongside in his drag, and knowing both Guyon and Stallbrass, proposed to the latter to "have a spurt;" and away went Tit Trafford's four bays and Stallbrass's chestnut pair careering off in a race in which the latter had by no means the worst of it. Mr. Guyon disapproved of this proceeding, which caused him to clutch wildly at different portions of the phaeton, and shook and bumped him woefully,--disapproved of it so much that he pronounced it "infernally stoopid," and only fit to have been the act of a "dam schoolboy." It was not until they had secured a good place in the rank, horses had been removed, and a capital lunch spread, that the old gentleman recovered his equanimity. But long before luncheon, in fact within a minute of the phaeton's stopping, Mr. Guyon had descended into the ring and learned the latest odds about Devilskin. There, in the bawling, fighting, seething, jostling crowd, he made his way, listening to scraps of information given to him now and then by men who muttered mysteriously behind their betting-books, or took off their hats to whisper behind them into Mr. Guyon's ear. It was all right,--nothing to touch him; fit to run for a man's life, Sir Harvey had said that very morning. O, here was Sir Harvey. "Ah, my dear Sir Harvey, one word--only one!" and Mr. Guyon laid his trembling hand on the arm of a big stalwart Yorkshire squire, Sir Harvey Boyce, one of the keenest patrons of the turf, and owner of Devilskin. The two men stood aside for a moment, and Guyon said-- "About the horse? He's right?" "Right as the mail." "And--and--he's meant?" "Meant? d--n it, Guyon----"