The usual excitement and disputing follow, the usual time elapses—­whack number one is heard, all ready—­whack number two, on they come, snaffle bridles, pulling at their horses’ mouths as though they would pull the bit right through to the tips of their tails.  “Off” is the cry:  away they go again; Tacony breaks up—­again a gap, which huge strides speedily close up—­again Tacony wins.  Time, five minutes five seconds.  All is over, rush to the cars, &c.  Remarks:—­first, the pace is at the rate of twenty-four miles an hour; second, the clear old lady, who was only beaten by a length, is long out of her teens; is it not wonderful, and is she not glorious in her defeat?  Fancy Dowager Lady L——­ taking a pedestrian fit, and running a race along Rotten Row with some “fast young man;” what would you say, if she clutched his coat-tail as he touched the winning-post?  Truly, that dear old Lady Suffolk is a marvellous quadruped.  Reader, as you do not care to go back again with the Rowdies and Co., we will suppose ourselves returned to New York, and I can only hope you have not been bored with your day’s amusement.

Among the extraordinary fancies of this extraordinary race—­who are ever panting for something new, even if it be a new territory—­the most strange is the metallic coffin:  the grave is no protection against their mania for novelty.  In the windows of a shop in Broadway, this strange, and to my mind revolting, article may be seen, shaped like a mummy, fitting hermetically tight, and with a plate of glass to reveal the features of the inanimate inmate.  I have certainly read of the disconsolate lover who, on the death of her who ungratefully refused to reciprocate his affection, disinterred her body by stealth, supplied himself with scanty provision, and embarking in a small boat, launched forth upon the wide waters, to watch her gradual decomposition till starvation found them one common grave.  I also knew an officer, who, having stuffed an old and faithful dog, and placed him on the mantel-piece, when his only child died soon after, earnestly entreated a surgeon to stuff the child, that he might place it beside the faithful dog.  Nevertheless, I cannot believe that such aberrations of human intellect are sufficiently frequent to make the Patent Metallic Coffin Company a popular or profitable affair.

An important feature in a populous town is the means of conveyance, which here, in addition to hack cabs and omnibuses, includes railway carriages.  I would observe, once for all, that the horses of America, as a whole, may be classed as enduring, wiry, and active hacks.  You do not see anything to compare with some of the beautiful nags that “Rotten Row” or Melton exhibits; but, on the other hand, you rarely see the lumbering, lolloping, heavy brutes so common in this country.  Then, again, a horse in this country is groomed and turned out in a style which I never saw in America, and therefore shows to much greater advantage, in spite of the Yankee sometimes