The _enceinte du pesage_, often called in vulgar English "the betting-ring," or the enclosure mentioned above to which holders of twenty-franc tickets are admitted, at Longchamps is scrupulously guarded by the stewards of the Jockey Club from the invasion of the _demi-monde_--a term that I employ in the sense in which it is understood to-day, and not in that which it bore twenty years ago. A woman of this demi-monde, which the younger Dumas has defined as that "community of married women of whom one never sees the husbands," may enter the paddock if she appears upon the arm of a gentleman, but the really objectionable element is obliged to confine itself to the five-franc stands or to wander over the public lawns. Some of the fashionable actresses of the day and the best-known _belles-petites_ may be seen sunning themselves in their victorias or their "eight-springs" by the side of the track in front of the stands, but this is not from any interest that they feel in the performances of Zut or of Rayon d'Or, but simply because to make the "return from the races" it is necessary to have been to them, and every woman of any pretension to fashion, no matter what "world" she may belong to, must be seen in the gay procession that wends its way through the splendid avenue on the return from Longchamps. The great day at Longchamps, that crowns the Parisian season like the "bouquet" at the end of a long series of fire-works, is the international fete of the Grand Prix de Paris, run for the first time in 1863. It is open to entire horses and to fillies of all breeds and of all countries, three-year-olds, and of the prize, one hundred thousand francs, half is given by the city of Paris and half by the five great railway companies. It was the late duc de Morny who first persuaded the municipal council and the administrations of the railways to make this annual appropriation; ail of which, together with the entries, a thousand francs each, goes to the winner, after deducting ten thousand francs given to the second horse and five thousand to the third. Last year the amount won by Nubienne, carrying fifty-three and a half kilogrammes, was one hundred and forty-one thousand nine hundred and seventy-five francs, and the time made was three minutes thirty-three seconds on a track of three thousand metres--one mile seven furlongs, or three furlongs longer than that of the Derby at Epsom.