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DOMESTIC MANNEKS OF THE PKUSSIANS.

to get as far away from home as Vallendar or Winningen(about the distance of Chelsea from London).

In fine, such is the indisposition of a thorough-bred Ger-man to stir hand or foot, that even a kite is a rarity among theboys, and such active exercise as " prisoner's base" unknownat the schools; whilst among the grown men, we have beencredibly informed, many have not yet had energy enougheven to mount to the summit of the neighbouring fortress ofEhrenbreitstein.

Hence it will be idle to inform the reader that such enter-prising and exciting sports as hunting and racing and steeple-chasing are never carried on in the vicinity of the Rhenishcapital,* and that pedestrianism and running-matches arefeats of agility seldom or never performed by the Preussen.

* It may sound somewhat extravagant to refer the development of railways andelectric telegraphs throughout the World to the English love of horse-racing, butthosewho have traced the gradual extension of the facilities of intercommunicationcan hardly come to any other conclusion.

Racing was a populär sport in England from the earliest tiraes. Fitzstephen,who wrote in the days of Henry II. (1154-89), mentions the delight taken by theCitizens of London in the diversion. Charles II. patronised the sport, and gavea silver cup of the value of 100 guineas to the owner of the winning horse ; whilstWilliam III. not only added to " the plates," but founded an academy for riding.All this necessarily tended to direct public attention in England to the improve-ment of the breed of horses generally, so that after the introduction of " Godol-phin," the English racers rose to such perfection that " Flying Childers" (in1720-30) was universally allowed to be the fleetest horse that had ever beenbred in the world, running 4 miles in 6 minutes and 48 seconds, which is at therate of 35^ miles per hour, or nearly as fast as an English express-train. ThenEnglish gentlemen got to feel such pride in the swiftness of their racers that,in 1739 an Act (13 Geo. II.) was passed for suppressing "races by ponies andweak horses; " and subsequently, in 1760, the celebrated horse "Eclipse" appearedon our courses, and he, though not quite so fleet as " Childers," was never beatenby any racer of his time.

Such wonderful development of the horse's capabilities, as regards speed,naturally made the nation disgusted with the old method of carrying letters incarts, at the slow rate of some five miles per hour, and thus prepared the govern-ment to adopt the plan of Mr. Palmer of Bath, who, in 1780, first proposedto establish fast coaches or mails, for the conveyance of letters and passengers,

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