'Go on, brave youths, till in some future age Whips shall become the senatorial badge; Till England see her thronging senators Meet all at Westminster in boots and spurs; See the whole House with mutual phrensy mad, Her patriots all in leathern breeches clad; Of bets for taxes learnedly debate, And guide with equal reins a steed or state.'(77) (77) Ibid. And then at the winning-post what motley confusion. --------------------'A thousand tongues Jabber harsh jargon from a thousand lungs. **** Dire was the din--as when in caverns pent, Hoarse Boreas storms and Eurus works for vent, The aeolian brethren heave the labouring earth, And roar with elemental strife for birth.'(78) (78) 'The Gamblers.' Horace had said long before--Tanto cum strepitu ludi spectantur, 'So great a noise attends the games! The frauds and stratagems of wily craft which once passed current at Newmarket, surpassed everything that can be imagined at the present day. The intruding light of the morning was execrated by the nightly gamblers. 'Grant us but to perish in the light,' was the prayer of the warlike Ajax:--'Grant us black night for ever,' exclaimed the gambler; and his wishes were consistent with the place and the foul deeds perpetrated therein.(79) (79) The principal gambling-room at Newmarket was called the 'Little Hell.' Sit mihi fas audita loqui--sit numine vestro, Pandere res alta terra et caligine mersas. The turf-events of every succeeding year verify the lament of the late Lord Derby:-- 'The secession from the turf of men who have station and character, and the accession of men who have neither, are signs visible to the dullest apprehension. The once national sport of horse-racing is being degraded to a trade in which it is difficult to perceive anything either sportive or national. The old pretence about the improvement of the breed of horses has become a delusion, too stale for jesting.' Nothing is more incontestable than the fact that the breed of English horses has not been really improved, certainly not by racing and its requirements. It has been truly observed that 'what is called the turf is merely a name for the worst kind of gambling. The men who engage in it are as far as possible from any ideal of sporting men. It is a grim joke, in fact, to speak of "sport" at all in their connection. The turf to them is but a wider and more vicious sort of tapis vert--the racing but the rolling of the balls--the horses but animated dice. It is difficult to name a single honest or manly instinct which is propagated by the turf as it is, or which does not become debased and vitiated by the association. From a public recreation the thing has got to be a public scandal. Every year witnesses a holocaust of great names sacrificed to the insatiable demon of horse-racing--ancient families ruined, old historic memories defiled at the shrine of this vulgarest and most vicious of popular passions.'