Page:Littell's Living Age - Volume 126.djvu/253

Rh his help before a suitable repartee had occurred to himself.

The entries concluded, the company sat down to dinner, after which they proceeded to the lotteries, the serious business of the evening. Several other officers now dropped in, among them Colonel Tartar, with whose dignity it was hardly compatible to partake of a race-ordinary, but who patronized the races in an affable way, as became a man with a reputation in the shires and noted lightweight rider in his younger days, and indeed was not above employing the evening in making a little book. "How do, Yorke?" said the little colonel with a friendly nod; "so you have got something in for my cup. I suppose that's the little horse Falkland was speaking about — a tidy jumper, he tells me; well, I wish you all luck, but I am afraid I sha'n't be able to back you this time."

Proceedings were interrupted at first by an objection lodged against the confederates' horse, it being a condition that all horses entered for the cup should be bonâ fide the property of officers at the station; while the known impecunious state of the partners, whose domestic embarrassments in connection with the local shopkeepers constituted the principal business at the monthly sittings of the cantonment small-cause court, rendered it matter of question how they should have come by such a property. The production of their entrance-money in hard cash had indeed occasioned some little surprise; but the objection was disposed of on Egan's producing a letter from the late owner accepting the joint promissory note of himself and M'Intyre at six months' date, for a sum, the amount of which was concealed from the referee by a dirty thumb placed over the figures, whereon the company proceeded to make out the lotteries. The drawing of these, with the interpolated betting, occupied a considerable time, Egan and M'Intyre both going into the work like millionaires; while it was observable that, notwithstanding the doubt previously thrown upon their credit, no one declined to bet with these gentlemen, even Colonel Tartar booking more than one transaction of the kind. The steeplechase lottery came last. It was the only one to which Yorke subscribed, and as there were fifty lots and only six horses, it was not surprising that he drew a blank. In the auction which followed the drawing. Scurry's horse was clearly declared the favourite, being bought in by the owner for thirty gold mohurs, while Lunge's fetched only fifteen; the confederates' mare was purchased by her owners for ten, and Yorke's horse by Colonel Tartar for five. "Can't do much harm by losing twenty chicks," observed the colonel, in Anglo-Indian argot, as the lot was knocked down to him; "and after all, there is a good deal of uncertainty about steeple-chasing."

 

 From Blackwood's Magazine.

Belton. Did you read the account of the last sale of pictures and china at auction in Paris?

Mallett. Yes; and it struck me that the prices which some of them brought were enormous.

Belton. What struck me more than anything was, that the modern pictures brought such high prices. One expects the works of the old masters to bring large prices. Time itself has added value to them. They are comparatively rare, and every day they are diminished in number by accidents of every kind. There is a factitious value attached to them beyond their real and undoubted merit. They are sealed with the stamp of fame. Centuries have gone by since they were painted. Generation after generation has praised and copied them; and one feels secure, in purchasing an undoubted original by Titian, Raffaelle, or any of the great masters, that, beyond the delight it will give, it is a safe investment. It is not very probable that the verdict of centuries will suddenly be reversed, and that they will lose the estimation in which they are held.

Mallett. I am not quite so sure of that. Tastes change very rapidly, and pictures which were highly esteemed fifty or thirty years ago are now looked at with a cold, critical, and inauspicious eye. We can each of us remember when Guido was a great name, and when his pictures stood in the first rank. He has certainly fallen very much from his pride of place. We are getting more critical and fastidious, and a new taste is growing up. Prices indeed have risen, and a good picture of his would probably bring nearly if not quite as much as it would have done twenty years ago; but relatively he has very much fallen in the scale. 