It was indeed the great knell of universal railway smashdom, the St. Sepulchre’s boom of found-out humbug. So down went the Railway King, and down into the kennel toppled the iron crown—not so much of Lombardy, this time, as of those Lombards whose arms are three golden spheres. An iron crown to moralise over, that; and of which, as of a red-hot halfpenny, the motto reads appositely—“_Guai a chi la tocca_,” “Woe be to him who touches it.” Albert Gate, the near house, yet saw lighted rooms, and great revelry and feasting, and a brave tenant; no other than Master Fialin Persigny, Ambassador of France. Courtly, witty, _rusé_ Persigny Fialin! the nobles and princes were as glad to come to his merry-makings as in the old time, when the now broken-down Railway Stag held high court there. Crafty Fialin! he must have rubbed his hands sometimes, with a sly chuckle, as, from the upper chambers of his splendid house, he tried to descry, far off at Kensington, a now waste spot where once stood GORE HOUSE. And, oh! he must have sung—“What a very fine thing it is to be Ambassador-in-law to a very magnificent three-tailed Bashaw of an Emperor, and to live at Albert Gate.” Not so many years since, though, master and man were glad to take tea at Gore House, with the beautiful Woman who wrote books, and the handsome Count who painted portraits; when the Bashaw’s bills were somewhat a drug in the discount market, and his ambassador did not precisely know how to make both ends meet. All of which proves that the world is full of changes, and that fortune is capricious, and that master and man have made an uncommonly good thing of it. Don’t be afraid of a sudden raid on my part towards the lands that lie beyond Brentford. My present business lies close to Hyde Park Corner, close to St. George’s Hospital. We have but to turn down Lower Grosvenor Place, and lo and behold, we are at our destination—TATTERSALL’S. I suppose the British Empire could not progress prosperously without Tattersall’s; so, I suppose, we must cry Tattersall’s and the Constitution! Tattersall’s and our Ancient Institutions! Tattersall’s and Liberty! And, indeed, of the last there seems in reality to be much liberty, and equality, and fraternity in all connected with horse-racing; and at Tattersall’s, though the resort of the most patrician turfites, the democratic element is appreciably strong. So long as both parties pay their bets, dukes and dustmen, Jews and jockeys, seem to meet upon a cheerful footing of “man to man” at this peculiarly national establishment.