cote, who went to fetch a midwife late at night, who murdered the newly born infant, and in fact committed atrocities sufficient to obtain him a place as an especial villain in Sir Walter Scott's Rokeby. There is still, we are told, in the neighbourhood of Littlecote Hall, a stile known as "Dayrell's stile," over which he broke his neck, from his horse falling with him. A correspondent, however, who is well acquainted with the locality and the tradition, has favoured us with the following interesting particulars, which come very apropos to the plate. ROKEBY. A more remarkable Derby than that just decided it would perhaps be difficult to instance. There were the Running Rein and Bloomsbury years, each remarkable in itself; but this Epsom anniversary has been more marked than either. A variety of causes helped to produce this effect, the most prominent beingthe smallness of the field; the winner being trained by private hands; the strenuous efforts to "get at " him; and last, although not least, the settling being so opposite to general expectation. One after another of the cracks disappearing with such rapidity, was destructive at once to the hopes and wishes of the backers of De Clare, Rifleman, Oulston, and St. Hubert. Still interest was at its height for the premiership, the candidates being The Lord of the Isles, Kingstown, and Wild Dayrell. The result of the race was similar to Voltigeur's year, the winner being trained in private stables, and the owner of the second horse the same as in that year, when Mr. H. Hill's Pitsford carried off second honours. This victory dealt a deathblow to those who by their plotting and scheming so perseveringly endeavoured to mar Wild Dayrell's chance. Even just prior to the star, Mr, Popham was offered £5000 not to run his horse. The settling, which was to be so satisfactory, was otherwise, and in one or two instances, curses both "loud and deep "have been uttered on the offending heads of heavy defaulters, many of the disappointed having too much reason to echo the refrain of Madame Thillon's popular ballad "Oh, Minnie! now, Minnie! I'm waiting for thee." But leaving these levanters to their bad pre-eminence, for a more genial theme, it may not be out of place to mention that Mr. F. Popham, the chief owner (a leg being Lord Craven's) of the winner of the Derby, is well known to all who have hunted in the Craven country. His seat, Littlecote Hall, near Hungerford, besides being a spot with which most anglers are familiar, is remarkable for the romance which surrounds its historical associations; many a lover of the marvellous has revelled over "deeds of dreadful note" to be met with in the legend of Littlecote. Indeed, this is the origin of Mr. Popham's horse being named Wild Dayrell. In the reign of Elizabeth, a midwife was aroused from her slumbers by a messenger, who, upon the door being opened, blindfolded her, and, placing her on a pillion, rattled his steed over all sorts of fences, being evidently in a hurry to get home." Arriving at a mansion, he conducted her into a chamber, informing her she was in a room with a lady in labour, and urged her to perform her duty; but nature having superceded her, all she had to do was to receive a male infant. As soon as all was over, she was desired to prepare for her departure; but previous to leaving, she contrived to cut off a piece of the bed curtain. This she deposed to on the trial, adding, that before remounting, she experienced a great smell of burning. When the guide left her, he swore her to secresy, at the same time presenting her with five-andtwenty guineas, and relieving her of the bandage. The midwife was also positive to the steps on the landing, and the piece from the curtain, when tried, fitted exactly. The result, however, was, that the owner of Littlecote, who had been arraigned of the double crimes of incest and child murder, was acquitted; whether justly or not was a question-Mr. Burke, in his anecdotes of the aristocracy, inclining to a belief in the innocence of the prisoner; on the other hand, Sir Walter Scott, in the notes of Rokeby, shares the popular belief that Dayrell was guilty, and that he succeeded in obtaining a favourable verdict by bribing the judgePopham, with the seat still held by that family. However, be it as it may, it is clear that a few months afterwards he fell from his horse in endeavouring to take a stile in Littlecote Park, and died whilst uttering the most revolting oaths. As a matter of certainty it follows, ever after the spot was haunted, and in consequence dreaded by the peasant whose lot it might be to pass Dayrell's stile when night had set in. Speaking from experience, the inditer of these presents must confess that on one occasion, when near the haunted spot, he was accompanied by a friend who declared he saw the ghost; the conviction of the writer inclining to the presence of deer, whose antlers might by some visions have been mistaken for something certainly not earthly. The scene of the accompanying sketch would appear to be laid in the East, where the eagle is said even now not only to pursue the deer and antelope tribes on his own account, but occasionally to be used as a falcon. In this country, on the other hand, he has always been found difficult to "break," although his strength and determination might well fit him for such a species of sport as here engaged upon. In the eagle's nests near any of our deer forests the remains of young red deer are very generally discovered, and Mr. St. John is of opinion that an eagle would carry up a deer-calf "easily enough." 5 RECOLLECTIONS OF THE LATE SAM CHIFNEY. BY ZINGANEE. CHAPTER NINTH.-PRIAM, "Thunder, and rain, and lightning, It was on a fine morning (as the novelists remark) just before the July meeting of 1828, that the Chifneys sauntered out together to look at Sir John Shelley's young things, which had come up to Newmarket for sale, and were taking their airing at the foot of the Warren Hill. A report had reached them, that there was a wonderfully fine colt by Emilius, out of Cressida, among the lot. The blood of this renowned son of Orvile was just coming into fashion, and as they were both stricken with a deep fancy for the colt the moment they set eyes on him, Will boldly determined to make a dash for a second Zingance, and to have him at any price. He was quite unbroken at the time, and the stable were so anxious to keep him, that they ran him up to 950gs. Beyond that point they would not go; and Mr. Tattersall, after looking round him with a serio-comic expression, and exclaiming pathetically, "No more bidders? and only going for 1,000gs. ! What are poor breeders to do?" knocked him down to Will Chifney. There was no room for him at either Will's or Sam's stables, and hence he stood for a few months at Sam Day's, and learnt his first lesson in the way he should go, from the hands and lips of Martin Starling. During the whole of his two-year-old season, he was untried either in public or private; but his new owners were so confident in his powers, that they engaged him very heavily, trusting to their notions of his form, and a rough gallop or two with Zinganee before Ascot. The first horse he ever galloped with was Flacrow, and Will declares that he never saw any young thing run so raw, or get beaten off so far. He was a dark-bay animal, about whom good judges formed the most opposite notions. Lord Darlington took a violent dislike to him, and never believed that he would stay the Derby course; while Lord Chesterfield used enthusiastically to declare that he could look at him all day," and that he was "the only blood horse he had ever seen." At the first glance, he seemed rather a tall, short horse; but although he was slightly leggy, he could hardly be said to want length. In height he was a trifle above fifteen three, rather light-limbed, and with lightish back-ribs, from which his opponents especially drew their "short- coursed" inferences. His great beauty lay in his forehand; and he had deep oblique shoulders, and one of the most expressive and blood-like of heads. Lord Darlington had well nigh proved his evil genius, as the horse caught a violent cold from a long inspection which he made of him when he passed through New |