treasure, sometimes treats them with a cruelty
scarcely to be believed, and not at all to be
justified. The severest treatment which the
English race-horse endures is gentleness com-
pared with the trial of the young Arabian.
Probably the filly has never before been
mounted ; she is led out ; her owner springs
on her back, and goads her over the sands and
rocks of the desert, at full speed, for fifty or
sixty miles, without one moment's respite.
She is then forced, steaming and panting, into
water deep enough for her to swim. If, imme-
diately after this, she will eat as if nothing
had occurred, her character is established, and
she is acknowledged to be a genuine descend-
ant of the Kochlani breed. The Arab is not
conscious of the cruelty which he thus inflicts :
it is an invariable custom ; and custom will
induce us to inflict many a pang on those whom,
after all, we love.
The following anecdote of the attachment
of an Arab to his mare has often been told, but
it comes home to the bosom of every one pos-
sessed of common feeling. " The whole stock
of an Arab of the desert consisted of a mare.
The French consul offered to purchase her, in
order to send her to his sovereign, Louis XIV.
The Arab would have rejected the proposal at
once with indignation and scorn ; but he was
miserably poor. He had no means of supply-
ing his most urgent wants, or procuring the
barest necessaries of life. Still he hesitated ;
he had scarcely a rag to cover him and his
wife and children were starving. The sum
offered was great, it would provide him and
his family with food for life. At length, and
reluctantly, he consented. He brought the
mare to the dwelling of the consul, he dis-
mounted, he stood leaning upon her ; he
looked now at the gold, and then at his fa-
vorite ; he sighed he wept. ' To whom is
it/ said he, ' I am going to yield thee up ? To
Europeans, who will tie thee close, who will
beat thee, who will render thee miserable.
Return with me, my beauty, my jewel, and
rejoice the hearts of my children.' As he
pronounced the last words, he sprung upon
her back, and was out of sight in a moment."
The next anecdote is scarcely less touching,
and not so well known. Ibrahim, a poor, but
worthy Arab, unable to pay a sum of money
which he owed, was compelled to allow a
merchant of Rama to become partner with
him in a valuable mare. When the time came,
he could not redeem his pledge to this man,
and the mare was sold. Her pedigree could
be traced, on the side of sire and dam,
for full five hundred years. The price was
three hundred pounds ; an enormous sum in
that country. Jbi'ahim \vent frequently to
Rama to inquire after the mare : he would
embrace her, wipe her eyes with his hand-
kerchief, rub her with his shirt sleeves,
and give her a thousand benedictions during
whole hours that he remained talking to her.
' My eyes !' would he say to her, ' my soul !
my heart ! must I be so unfortunate as to have
thee sold to so many masters, and not keep
thee myself? I am poor, my antelope ! I
brought thee up in my dwelling, as my child.
I did never beat nor chide thee ; I caressed
thee in the proudest manner. God preserve
thee, my beloved \ thou art beautiful, thou art
sweet, thou art lovely ! God defend thee from
envious eyes !''
PIERCE EGAN'S BOOK OF SPORTS.
U
Sir Jena Malcolm gives two anecdotes to
the same purpose, but of a more amusing na-
ture.
" When the envoy, returning from his former
mission, was encamped near Bagdad, an Arab
rode a bright bay mare of extraordinary shape
and beauty before his tent, until he attracted
his attention. On being asked if he would
sell her . ' What will you give me ?' was the
reply : ' That depends upon her age ; I sup-
pose she is past tive ?' ' Guess again,' said
he. ' Four ?' ' Look at her mouth,' said the
Arab, with a smile. On examination she was
found to be rising three. This, from her size
and symmetry, greatly enhanced her value.
The envoy said, * I will give you fifty toman'
(a coin nearly of the value of a pound sterling).
* A little more, if you please,' said the fellow,
apparently entertained. 'Eighty. A hundred.'
He shook his head and smiled. The offer at
last came to two hundred tomans ! * Well/
said the Arab, 'you need not tempt me further;
it is of no use. You are a rich elchee (no-
bleman). You have fine horses, camels, and
mules, and, I urn told, you have loads of silver
and gold. Now/ added he, ' you want my
mare ; but you should not have her for all
you have got.' "
" An Arab sheick or chief, who lived within
fifty miles of Bussorah, had a favorite breed of
horses. He lost one of his best mares, and
could not, for a long while, discover whether
she was stolen or had strayed. Some time
after, a young man of a different tribe, who
had long wished to marry his daughter, but
had always been rejected by the sheick, ob-
tained the lady's consent and eloped with her.
The sheick and his followers pursued, but the
lover and his mistress, mounted on one horse,
made a wonderful march, and escaped. The
old chief swore that the fellow was either
mounted upon the devil, or the favorite mare he
had lost. After his return, he found the latter
was the case ; that the lover was the thief of
his mare as well as his daughter ; and that he
stole the one to carry off the other. The chief
was quite gratified to think he had not been
beaten by a mare of another breed ; and was
easily reconciled to the young man, in order
that he might recoverthe mare, which appeared
an object about which he was more solicitous
than about his daughter."
One of our own countrymen, the enterpiis-
ing traveller, major Denham, affords us a
pleasing instance of the attachment with which
the docility and sagacity of the horse may
inspire the owner. He thus relates the death
of his favorite Arabian, in one of the most
desert spots of Central Africa. His feelings
needed no apology. We naturally honor the
man in whom true sensibility and undaunted
courage, exerted for useful purposes, were
thus united.
" There are a few situations in a man's life in
which losses of this nature are felt most keenly;
and this was one of them. It was not grief,
but it was 3 mething very nearly approaching
to it ; and though I felt ashamed of the degite-
of derangement I suffered from it, yet it was
several days before I could get over the loss.
Let it, however, be remembered that the poor
animal had been my support and comfort,
nay, I may say, companion, through many a
dreary day and night ; had endured both
hunger and thirst in my service ; and was so
docile that he would stand still for hours, in
the desert, while I slept between his legs, his
body affording me the only shelter that could
be obtained from the powerful influence of a
noon-day sun , he was yet the fleetest of the
fleet, and ever foremost in the chase."
Our horses would fare badly on the scanty
nourishment afforded the Arabian. The mare
usually has but one or two meals in twenty-
four hours. During the day she is tied to the
door of the tent, ready for the Bedouin to
spring, at a moment's warning, into the saddle;
or she is turned out before the tent, ready sad-
dled, the bridle merely taken off, and so
trained that she gallops up immediately at her
master's call. At night she receives a little
water ; and with her scanty provender of five
or six pounds of barley or beans, and some-
times a little straw, she lies down, content, in
the midst of her master's family. She can,
however, endure great fatigue ; she will travel
fifty miles without stopping ; she has been
pushed, on emergency, one hundred and
twenty miles, and, occasionally, neither she
nor her rider has tasted food for three whole
days.
To the Arabian, principally, England is
indebted for her improved and now unrivalled
breed of horses for the turf, the field, and the
road.
ON THE USEFULNESS OF PUGILISM.
Of late years, it has been so much the cant
of the puritanical part of society to run down
the SPORTS and AMUSEMENTS of the people of
England ; and also, if possible, not only to
reduce them in their manly spirit and cha-
racter, but to change their good old habits
and feelings into a strait-haired race of im-
postors and hypocrites. Perish the thought '
We hope, nay we feel assured, that we shall
never see the arrival of that day, when the
TRUE COURAGE of Britons will be frittered
down into mere dandyism, so conspicuous to
"resent an injury," or "to forgive an in-
sult" and which have rendered the British
flag triumphant, both in our fleets and armies,
all over the world.
The following opinion of that enlightened
senator the late Right Hon. W. Windham,
who so animatedly delivered his sentiments
in parliament in favor of the sports and
amusements of the people of England, is a
complete answer to all the cant and humbug
in opposition to it: "True courage," said
Mr. Windham, "does not ari^e from mere
boxing from the mere beating or being ieatcn.
12
PIERCE EGAN'S BOOK OF SPORTS.
but from the SENTIMENTS excited by the con-
templation and cultivation of such practices."
In support of which doctrines may be added,
the undaunted and persevering traits of a
SHAW (the life-guardsman and pugilistic
champion) at the memorable epoch in the
history of nations, the great battle at Waterloo,
so pointedly described by that illustrious
poet, Anacreon Moore :
" Oh, shade of the cheesemonger ! you who, alas !
.Doitbhtt up by the dozen those Mounseers in brass,
On that great day of milling when blood lay in lakes,
V/benXiNcsAeW f6e60tt/e,andEUBOF> the stakes!"
" I was preparing to say 'Good night,' after
handing the young lady down stairs at the
Opera House, when her brother, with the
pleasant freedom of an old acquaintaince,
pressed me to take a sandwich in St. James's
Street, and as his sentiments, as far as they
had been communicated, agreed with mine, I
accepted his invitation with the same frank-
ness with which it was made. The female
between us, we proceeded along Pall Mall ;
and turning up St. James's Street, two men,
apparently in a state of intoxication, reeled
out of an entry, and attempted to seize hold
of the lady, who at that moment was un-
guarded on the right hand, her brother being
a few paces in the rear. The street, as far as
we could distinguish, was unoccupied, not
even the voice of a watchman interrupted
the solemn silence ; but the moon shone with
resplendent lustre, and my new friend,
alarmed by his sister's screams, witli the
swiftness of a feathered Mercury, flew along
the pavement, and with one blow, laid the
foremost of our assailants in the kennel. I
was the more surprised at this, because his
stature did not exceed five feet, and from the
view I had of him, I was not prepared for
uncommon strength. Our enemies were
seemingly tall, raw-boned coal-heavers, and
though one of them was for the moment ren-
dered incapable, our case appeared so despe-
rate, that to the lady's cries, I added a call
for the watch ; but my companion, nothing
daunted, bade me take care of his sister, and
fear nothing: * for,' continued he, ' if I cannot
manage such rascals as these, I deserve to be
d d.' The second ruffian, seeing his fellow
on the ground, resumed his sobriety, and
aimed a blow at me, but in so clumsy a man-
ner, that I not only avoided it, but preserved
my fair charge from harm ; on which our
little champion rushed forward, received the
blow on the point of his elbow, and returned
another in the pit of the stomach, which so
staggered the wretch, that he reeled several
paces, and finally tumbled headlong into an
area, at least three yards deep. What I have
employed so many words in relating was the
work of a moment. Having taught his foes
to bite the ground, our skilful champion seized
hold of his sister's disengaged arm, and not
suffering the grass to grow under our feet,
ve arrived in safety at his house.
" This anecdote will, I think, establish the
USEFULNESS OF PUGILISM ; had my friend beett
as little knowi7ig in the science as his adversa-
ries, very dreadful might have been the coM.se-
quences, because might in that case would
have overcome right, unless the fellows
would have had patience to wait till he ran
home for his sword; and then, indeed, he
might have killed them in a gentleman-like
manner.
" Every thing has its uses and its abuses.
But, though this be granted, shall we neglect
the use, because it may possibly bring the
abuse along with it ! I have heard declaimers
against the science of bruising say, * that a
knowledge of SELF-DEFENCE makes people
quarrelsome/ If I may speak, from very
limited experience, I think the contrary. I
was well acquainted with PERKINS, and never
in my life saw a more harmless, quiet, inof-
fensive bein;>;. I have the pleasure of knowing
GULLEY : yes, reader the pleasure! I would
rather know him than many Sir Ryllis and
Sir Dillys, and he is neither quarrelsome r
turbulent, nor overbearing.
" One evening, I accompanied honest
JAGS EM FRY to a tavern in Carey-street, kept
by JOHN GULLEY. As we passed along,
Emery said, * You conceive, I dare say,
Romney, that I am going to introduce you
into a society of rogues and pick-pockets, and
if you can compound for the loss of your purse
and handkerchief, it will be a lucky escape ;
but rest assured you are mistaken Gulley's
house is, of course, open to all descriptions,
but the majority of his customers are people
of reputation and respectability/
" This account, I confess, was some relief to
my mind, where a considerable degree of pre-
judice existed against prize-fighters, and the
houses they frequent. GULLEY" was unfortu-
nately from home, but CRIB, the champion of
England, was officiating as his locum-tcnens,
and handing about pots of porter and grog
with persevering industry. Mrs. GULLEY, a
neat little woman, civil and attentive, super-
intended the business of the bar ; where,
through Emery's interest, for I found he was
in high favor , we obtained leave to sit.
CRIB uncorked and decanted, but could not
give us his company (which to me, as a novi-
tiate in such scenes, would have been a treat)
owing to the business of the house, which he
seemed to pursue much to its master's interest.
CUIB, who had obtained popularity by his
prowess, was originally a coal-heaver, and
has several brothers in the same employment:
he is sturdy and stout built, about five and
twenty, stands five feet eight inches, clumsy
in appearance, rather hard featured, with a
profile not unlike Cooke the tragedian. He
is, I believe, a good-natured, quiet fellow,
and after we had detained him a few minutes
in conversation, "Well," said Emery, "what
do you think of the greatest man in his way,
or perhaps any other can boast ? for GULLET
has altogether declined the business."
PIERCE EGAN'S BOOK OF SPORTS.
13
" ' Why, to speak the truth, notwithstanding:
your caution, I expected, in a house kept and
frequented by boxers, to have seen nothing
but blackguards, and to have heard nothing
but blasphemy ; but I am so pleasingly de-
ceived, and so comfortably situated, that I
believe this \vill not be the last visit I shall
pay Mrs. GULLEY.' " Riley's Itinerant.
LORD BYRON'S TASTE FOR BOXING.
Among the least romantic (says his Lord-
hip's biographer, Mr. Moore), perhaps, of
the exercises in which he took delight was
that of boxing or sparring. This taste it was
that, at a very early period, brought him ac-
quainted with the distinguished professor of
that art, Mr. Jackson, for whom he continued
through life to entertain the sincerest regard,
one of his latest works containing a most
cordial tribute, not only to the professional,
but social qualities of this sole prop and orna-
ment of pugilism. During his stay at Brighton
this year, Jackson was one of his most con-
stant visitors, the expense of the professor's
chaise thither and back being always defrayed
by his noble patron. He also honored with
his notice, at this time, D'Egville, the ballet-
master, and Grimaldi, to the latter of whom
he sent, as I understand, on one of his benefit
nights, a present of five guineas.
Having been favored by Mr. Jackson
with copies of the few notes and letters, which
he has preserved out of the many addressed
to him by Lord Byron, I shall here lay before
the reader one or two, which bear the date
of the present year, and which, though refer-
ring to matters of no interest in themselves,
give, perhaps, a better notion of the actual
life and habits of the young poet, at this
time, than could be afforded by the most elab-
orate, and in other respects important cor-
respondence. They will show, at least, how
very little akin to romance were the early
pursuits and associates of the author of Childe
Harold, and, comomed with what we know
of the still less romantic youth of Shakspeare,
prove how unhurt the vital principle of genius
can preserve itself even in atmospheres ap-
parently the most ungenial and noxious to it.
TO MR. JACKSON.
" N. A. Notts, Sept. 18, 1808.
" Dear Jack, I wish you would inform
me what has been done by Jekyll, at No. 40,
Sloane-square, concerning the pony I returned
as unsound.
" I have also to request you will call on
Louch at Brompton, and inquire what the
devil he meant by sending such an insolent
letter to me at Brighton ; and at the same
time tell him I by no means can comply with
the charge he has made for things pretended
to be damaged.
" Ambrose behaved most scandalously
about the pony. You may tell Jekyll if he
does not refund the money, I shall put the
affair into my lawyer's hands. Five and
twenty guineas is a sound price for a pony,
and by , if it costs me five hundred pounds,
I will make an example of Mr. Jekyll, and
that immediately, unless the cash is returned.
" Believe me, dear Jack, &c.
However singular it may appear, it is true,
that on the morning of the funeral of his
mother, having declined following the remains
himself, he stood looking, from the abbey
door, at the procession, till the whole had
moved off; then turning to young Rushton,
who was the only person left besides himself,
he desired him to fetch the sparring-gloves,
and proceeded to his usual exercise with the
boy. He was silent and abstracted all the
time, and, as if from an effort to get the better
of his feelings, threw more violence, Rushton,
thought, into his blows than was his habit;
but, at last, the struggle seeming too much
for him, he flung away the gloves, and retired
to his room."
The late Lord Byron, to use a sporting
phrase, "set-to" with the gloves better than
most gentlemen, leaving noblemen entirely
out of the question. He was fond of sparring
as a science ; he also admired it as a manly,
noble art an art that taught him the value
of self-defence, and to support the true cha-
racter of an Englishman,wit hout resorting to
the aid of the dagger, pistol, ball, or any
other deadly weapon. He was likewise
attached to sparring as an exercise, in which
lnj was well assured had its advantages
towards the promotion of health, cheerfulness,
and long life. His Lordship, like his poetry,
always entered into the spirit of the thing ;
he viewed hazing as a national propensity
a stimulus to true courage ; and, like the
most illustrious personage in the kingdom, he
was not ifraid of witnessing a fight in the
prize ring. In setting-to, his lordship was
never afraid of meeting the attack, but, on,
the contrary, he received with coolness from
his antagonist, and returned upon his oppo-
nent with all the vigour and confidence of
a master of the art. If his Lordship was
not a DON JUAN in every part that he under-
took, he nevertheless must be viewed in the
character of a hero; a common-place situation
in any department of life would not suit the
enlarged mind of the author of " Childe
Harold." Lord Byron saw things in a very
different light from most other men ; and, with
all his errors, his premature death was an
immense loss to his country. His Lordship
soared above the humbug, jant, and prejudice
of his day ; and in the most laudable manner
he exposed hypocrisy wherever it crossed hi*
path, and, rather unlike the "privileged order"
to which he belonged, he appeared quite at his
ease, and made himself as comfortable and
agreeable in the humble dwelling of an ac-
quaintance to those he saw around him as if
he had been sojourning in the loftiest palace
in the kingdom. Lord Byron admired ability
14
PIERCE EGAN'S BOOK OF SPORTS.
in every shape ; his Lordship was a man of
the world, and not that fastidious sort of per-
sonage to view men, as it were, through a
microscope, to obtain a knowledge of their
feelings and manners. He mixed with society
in all its different shades ; lie heard men talk
according to their situations in life ; he saw
their gestures* and he listened to their opinions,
as a kind of linger post to become acquainted
with the various traits of human nature ; he
warmly supported his brother poet's idea :
" That a man 's a man for a' and a' that."
The late Lord Byron has been seen with
several other first-rate characters in the
veteran Tom Cribb's house enjoying his glass
ofwine,andconversingupon subjects connected
with the sporting world, in the most animated
style ; indeed, his lordship was well aware
that an author whose intentions were to dis-
play something like ORIGINALITY in his writ-
ings, ought to view every thing in the different
walks of life with the most marked attention.
The movements of mankind were very import-
ant features in the " tablet of his memory,"
and to be treasured up with advantage to
himself, in order to be improved upon at his
leisure, and made known to the public at
some future period of his existence, with all
^lie embellishments of a superior artist, after
h'e manner of
" The poet's eye in a fine phrensy rolling."
As a proof of the above assertion, it should
seem that Lord Byron was most anxious to
establish himself in the opinion of the world
as a painter of real life that his likenesses
were correct to a shade, and likewise his
characters on the canvas should discover their
own natural dialogue, without the aid of art.
His Lordship, to show his versatility of
talent, and his intimate knowledge of the
various grades of society, had no objection
now and then to give the " sublime and beau-
tiful" touches of his pen a holiday, that he
might descend a few steps from his high
abode in the literary world, even with pro-
priety, as a writer on men and manners,
amidst the lowest of the "low folks,"
to describe some " doings," with a pecu-
liarity of touch ; exhibiting a fidelity of
research ; and sanctioned by the glowing
colours of truth. The following quotation
from the poem of Don Juan, Canto XI., stanza
19, and notes, will amply suffice :
" He fiom the world had cut off a great man
Who in his time had made heroic bustle ;
Who in a row, like Tom, could lead the van,
Booze in the ktn, or at the spell-ken hustle !
Who qite e r a FLAT ! Who (spite of Bow-street's ban)
On the high toby-spice so Ikish the muzzle ;
Who on a lark, with black-eyed Sal (his blowing)
So prime, so well, so smutty, and so knowing!*
* If there be any gemman so ignorant as to require
a traduction, 1 refer him to my old fiiend and corpo-
real pastor and master, John Jackson, Esq., professor
of pugilism ; who, 1 trust, still retains the strength
and symmetry of his model of a form, together with
ais good humour, and athletic as well as 'mental ac-
The advance of science and of language
has rendered it unnecessary to translate the
above good and true English, spoken in its
original purity by the select mobility and
their patrons. The following is a stanza of
a song which was very popular, at least in
my early days :
" On the high toby-spree flash tho muzzle
In spite of each gallows old scout,
If you at the spell kin can't hustle
You'll be hobbled in making a clout.
Then your blowing will wax gallows haughty,
When she hears of your scaly mistake,
She'll surely turn smitch for the forty,
That her Jack may be regular weight."
N. B. In accordance with the above wish
of the late Lord Byron, although at the dis-
tance of several years since Don Juan made
its appearance before the public, the numerous
friends in the sporting world of Mr. Jackson
will be pleased to hear that he does retain
his good humour, and athletic as well as
mental accomplishments ; the following
letter having been lately received by the
editor of the " BOOK OF SPORTS."