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Leader (1850-1860), 9th January 1858, Edition 1 of 2, Page 43, Untitled Article

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      Untitled Article

      Turf amusements of course hold a conspicuous place in a book treating on English field-sports , Racing was highly in vogue as early as the rei < mof Queen Elizabeth , and many a wealthy lord literally brought his noble to ninepence , by an unbridled devotion to this pursuit . - Among the mdst eminent personages who , during the last century , maintained a racing stud , was Charles James Fox . . . . In 177 ° Fox won at Newmarket 16 , 000 / ., principally by betting against the celebrated horse Pincher , who lost the match by only half a neck . The king ' s messenger was sometimes obliged to appear on the course , seeking oneof his cabinet , ministers among the sportsmen , to deliver despatches . The messenger , when on these errands , always concealed his badge of office tjbe Grey hound—not wishing the public to know his errand . But ! ox liked Newmarket better thaa Downing-street . In August , 1804 , took p lace on the last day of \ ork races a match between Colonel Thornton ' s wife and Mr . Flint , for five hundred guineas , And one thousand guineas bye ; distance four miles . Three days before the araees , the fair jockey mounted on Vingarillo , took a four-mile gallop . She was dressed in Mazarine blue , and wore a . neat black jockey-cap , looked very well , and was in high spirits . Starting off" at a canter , she sat her horse firmly , drew him out to the top of his speed , and showed that she had his powers perfectly in her command . All the knowing ones were astonished at the style of herseraauship ia which she performed her gallop , and declared it equal to that of Chifney or Buckle . Unfortunately , when within about three distances from home , the saddle-girths gave way , and she came with considerable violence to the ground . By great good luck , the bold equestrian did not sustain the slightest injury . But to the race . One hundred thousand persons assembled to witness it . The Lady took the lead for upwards of three miles ia most capital style ; her horse , however , had much the shorter stroke of the two , and when within a ntile irom home , Mr . Flint came up and passed her . Mrs Thornton used every exertion ; but finding it

      impossible to win the race , she pulled up in a sportsmanlike style , when within about two distances . Never , surely , did woman ride in better style- It was difficult to say whether her jockeyship , her dress , or her beauty were rnost * admired . ' The whole was perfect . Mrs . Thornton wore a leopard-coloured body , with blue sleeves , the rest buff , and blue cap . The race was run in nine minutes and fifty-nine seconds . No words can express the disappointment felt at the lady ' s defeat . The spirit she displayed , and the good humour with which she bore her loss , greatly diminished the triumph of many of the winners . Not less than 200 , 000 / . were pending on this match . In addition to the subjects already brought under notice , there is a good historical chapter on the aneient pastime of archery , and some clever hints for successful sea fishing . We perfectly agree with the author in thinking that angling in salt water will gradually supersede the , at present , miserable pottering in fresh water streams . Fly-fishing on the sea-shore is more exciting thau any sport our most carefully preserved salmon rivers can afford . The fish , instead of being reckoned at a few score per mile of water , exist in tens of thousands . Poachers cannot diminish or interfere with our amusements ; the sea is a great salt water lake , free and unrestricted for all .

      Merrie England overflows with racy , pungent anecdotes of a generation but just passed away , of which readers ia general know infinitely less than of times and persons who flourished a century before . The book is destined to lie upon the library and boudoir tables of many a country mansion j and its contents are specially adapted to please the tastes of those ladies who , born and nurtured among sportsmen , have learned to take an affectionate interest in the cherished pursuits of husband , father , brother , lover .

      Untitled Article

      DR . FELL'S TREATMENT OF CANCER . Report of the Surgical Staff of the Middlesex Hospital upon the Treatment of Cancerous Diseases on Dr . Fell ' s Plan . Churchill . The Middlesex Hospital is the only general hospital in London which has a special endowment for the maintenance of patients afflicted with cancer . On this account numerous soi-disant inventors of remedies for the treatment oi that incurable disease have , during the last fifty years , addressed themselves to that institution , offering their services ; but tlioy have one and all failed to effect a real cure . Some of them , in their desire for a lucrative reputation , resorted to most disgraceful practices in order to impose upon the officers of the hospital : the notorious Mr . Ashby , for example , who prebut

      tended to extract cancerous reptiles by an application of his own , was detected in putting the worms into his specific . This and similar cases of imposition led to the adoption of very stiingent rules ou the point , so thut oven medical men found it difficult ; to gain the car of the hos p ital authorities , and therefore quite an extraordinary reputation , already gauued , was necessary to induce the Weekly Board of Middlosex Hospital , instead of being applied to , to apply themselves to Dr . Fell for assistance in their wards . At first the communication , owing , we suppose , to some formality on the part of the hospitttl authorities , came to nothing ; but subsequently Dr . l ^ ell consented to treat a certain number of cases in the hospital wards , and conditionally to disclose his remedies , and it is the report of the results of this treatment , published by order of the Quarterly Court , which lies now

      bofore us . Dr , Fell commenced his course in the hospital on the 22 nd of January last . Twenty-five cases , some of them of long standing , had been selected to test the cflicucy of the now remedy , and , as the report of the stuff-surgeons of the hospittil says , — - ' —~ Tery ~ early- 'i n ~ tUe-oG 4 U'flo-of-oui % ol > sor-vationa ^ w £ method of treatment wau an improvement upon those previously known , but that it might prow » boon to many perooua hopelessly autlering from advanced ciincer . Accordingly , the principle upon which patients wore aqluetcd for treatment wna soon « Uored . Those first euoaen were , for tho moat part , » uoh aa might have beou subjeoted to a cutting operation ; and it was our object , ne woll as that of Pr . 1 ) ' « U , to compare tho results of the two modea of treatment in oaaeB adapted for cither . Hut ¦ w hen caaoa unauitod for the kuifo prosontod thomaulvos , in which thure appeared a reasonable prospect of 0011 furring' real , though it were only temporary , benellt by tho treatment , it was adoptod in thoin alao , Dr .. Fell made no reoorvo for the sake of

      his reputation if any amount of good could be done ; and accordingly cases will be found detailed which would never have been selected if regard had been had only to the appearance they would make in a judicial report . Dj . Fell ' s treatment proved a decided success . Of course we have no space to enter into details of a purely professional nature , and are content therefore , to mention that the highest eulogium is bestowed in the Report on the new remedy : — Nothing could be more striking ( it is said there ) than the contrast between the distressed condition of patients before they were treated and their comparative ease after wards . ' Every such patient restored to comfort , and with life prolonged , is a witness to the value of tln ' 3 treatment ; and we cannot but esteem him happy who could thus suggest and adapt to practice a method by -which life and ease are extended to many persons previously without hope of either . Whether a cancerous predisposition can be exterpated is another question ; that the disease , in its active state , can be effectually arrested Dr . Fell has proved .

      Untitled Article

      AN EX-CHANCELLOR EN DESHABILLE . A Handy Book on Property Law , in a Series of Letters . By Lord St . Leonards . William Blackwood and Sons . Thebk is a dignity in the latter years of the lives of our Chancellors which , is eminently characteristic of the unsullied integrity and incorruptible independence of the administration of justice , in a land of ordered freedom . Compare the old age of a Brougham , nobly active and beneficent , with the rapacious servility of a Dupin , and you have in ' this picture and this , the contrast of two governments and two nations . In the closing years of the Roman republic , when national virtue was not quite extinct , the great lawyers and statesmen withdrew gladly from the toil and turmoil of public life into the familiar tranquillity of the Villa or the Farm , tanquam injwrtum , and there , afar from the troubled winds and waves of faction , wrote and talked imperishably on the science of politics , on public law , on letters , philosophy , and art ., and sometimes on the highest and grandest hopes and speculations of humanitv . These conversations , these letters , have outlived the glory

      and the decadence of Rome republican and imperial , and are text-books ot fine thought and familiar wisdom for the select minds of all nations and all times . In our own England , which has so much of ancient Rome in its public spirit and temperament , many of our great statesmen and lawyers have been even more honoured in retreat than in power . Rising calm and clear above the mists of party , the light of their patriotism and intelligence has shone like a sunset . We may be pardoned for a somewhat digressive introduction to the very small , but very useful book which has suggested the historical comparison . One of the most consummate lawyers that ever occupied the woolsack , and whose treatises on real property are among the very highest authorities on all that important branch of English law , lias lately sat down in the leisure of his home to give a friend , possessed of an estate , and unlearned iu the law , and ( in the latter sense at least ) aptly

      representing the general public , a few clear , practical notions on law and ' legal points ; ' more particularly on the law in its relations to real property , and in all its manifold dispositions in the nature of contracts , sales , purchases , mortgages , leases , settlements , wills , trusts , &c . &c . Into twenty-five clear , concise , and familiar letters , Lord St . Leonards has compressed the pith and essence of the law on all these matters . How inestimable such precepts from such a hand , to every man who , as Lord St . Leonards says , ' cannot always have his solicitor at his elbow , ' it were superfluous to say , and the precepts , omitting nothing , explaining everything , are conveyed with a lightness and ease—we were going to say a friskiness—of style which irresistibly remind the reader ( be it said with all reverentre ) of a fine old hunter turned out to grass and kicking his heels at the sound of a horn . We are not so gratuitously sceptical as " to imagine that the matter is from one hand and the manner from another ; we gladly attribute the useful and the pleasant to the same mixture of wisdom

      admirable pen . In the presence of this happy sterling and quiet wit , we seem , mutatis mutandis , to be listening to a delightful old lady teaching social tactics to an enterprising granddaughter . What treasures of learning and sagacity condensed into a taw light tripping sentences , and what a fine vein of irony penetrating tho stratum of accumulated experience ! Diliicult as it must be to know so much , it is even more dillicult to bear such a weight of knowledge wo gracefully und , as it were , so unconsciously . Lord St . Leoimrds's Handy Book will be read by lawyers with E leasuro , and read again and again by laymen with pleasure and proiit . ivery one , it has been said , has some interest in real property : either tho interest of a defender of a fortress , or of an assailant ; while the lawyer , perhaps , may be said to feel the interest of both . The Letters on Wills , on Trustees , on tho Rights of Husband and Wife , ou their several Properties , on Judicial Separation and Divorce , have a , special value at tho present time , when the new legislation ou those subjects is coming into force .

      Untitled Article

      REPUBLICAT 1 ONS . Mmssits . Black wood have reprinted from Ji fad-wood's Magazine , in two volumes , Mr . George Eliot ' s Scenes of Clerical Life , including ' The bad Fortunes of the Reverend Amos Barton , ' ' Mr , GiliU ' a Lovo Story , and Janet's Repentance . ' Their quiet and original humour , the delicate insight into character displayed , tlio teudor and subtle pathos of tho several stories , have gained for Mr . Eliot n considerable and not . a common reputation , which will of course be largely increased now that Scenes of Clerical Life have passed out of iv magazuiu into tho circulating libraries . Another republieation of u , story woll known to our readers is Mr . Or . J . WhyXelMviin »^^ Magazine by J . W . Parker und Son . It is a thoroughly vigorous and dramatic narrative , with flushes of admirable writing , nud an ubunaauoo ok incidents and telling sketohesof character . Mr . Murray sends us « v very acceptable reprint in 0110 neat volume , price six shillings . It is tho Staff-OffioerV Letters from Liaucl-quarters , a book which hus called forth no little discussion , and w one oi the Aotr raluublo contributions to tho history of tho cumpag . i iu tho Crimea , aa conducted by

      Untitled Article

      Ttfo . 407 . Jiotabt 9 , 1858 . ] THE LEADER . 43

  • Citation
    • Leader (1850-1860), Jan. 9, 1858, page 43, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2225/page/19/