A black man resplendent in a red coat, white riding breeches and yellow gaiters, frankly admits his inferiority to the white man by begging for a penny, a holiday penny. Refused this trifle, he immediately assumes an attitude of equality. Patronisingly he sweeps the ground and the grand stand with his riding switch (his leggings are incorrectly strapped), and asks whether we agree with him that, “These be ver’ funny peoples, eh? Too much dirt. Too little money.” He sees Forrest making sketches and suggests that we might do infinitely worse than take him as a subject. He switches his leather boots with the riding cane (it is only a hedge switch), and shouts to his brother black dude a hundred yards away, that he will join him as soon as he has finished with his “pals.” He adds a P.S. that he is quite prepared to introduce his friend, if that gentleman is so inclined. We are his “pals.” Then he cocks his hat and chuckles at two passing girls, who respond with great enthusiasm. “Nice girls, eh? But not good enough for me, eh? Like to know them, eh?” But it should be admitted that the worst of the black men is not vainer than some of the whites. Before the people of the grand stand, some of the junior officers of the army and the hospital and the medical service, even the civil service, are engaged in a ceaseless parade--the strut of self-conscious vanity. It is these jackanapes that the black men imitate, and it may be that it is the caricature that shows the fatuity of the picture. Black vanity is not worse than white. Just as the buck nigger struts for the edification of the black damsel and her parents, so does the white officer or official. The effect in each case is equally ludicrous. One white official drove to the course wearing a hunting rig-out, spurs, a single eye-glass, and coloured cammer band. He wore an air of perfect self-satisfaction. In Jamaica, single eye-glasses are as common as orchids. Horse-racing has become a most popular sport with white Jamaicans. It is easy for any one to enter a horse or a pony and enjoy the sensation of being an owner. A twenty-guinea polo-pony race is just as good as a mile handicap for thoroughbreds, and, truth to tell, the winning owner gets even greater praise. It may be that this is as it should be. But the pity is that [Illustration: A BUNGALOW ON THE HILLS, JAMAICA] subalterns enter ponies bought on credit, and lose money in order to impress a pitying crowd of nonentities. When a race-horse costs but twenty pounds, and the entrance fee for a run costs only two or three pounds more, no junior officer can afford not to run. The youths of the regiments expect it. So officers under the rank of senior captains must run their ponies as well as attend the meetings. Then they must “back their gees” (as it is said in the vernacular), and lose more money in one day than they should have spent in six weeks.