to bring a horse to this culminating point of training, it is
still more difficult to keep him there, even for a period of a few
days. Training has been compared to the sides of a triangle: when one
has reached the apex one must perforce begin to descend. It being,
then, impossible that the animal should support for any length of time
the extreme tension of his whole organism that perfect training
supposes, it but very rarely happens that the horse prepared according
to this system--for the French Derby, for example--can be maintained in
such a condition as to enable him to win the Epsom Derby or the Grand
Prix de Paris. We have heretofore referred to the reaction against this
practice of excessive training, and to the efforts of Henry Jennings in
the direction of a reform--efforts which within the last few years have
been crowned with great success.

But we must now return to the Grand Prix. An invalid who had been
forbidden by his doctor to read the newspapers for several months, and
who should chance to make his first promenade on the Boulevards on the
eve of the Grand Prix, would know at a glance that something
extraordinary was about to happen. At every step he would meet the
unmistakable garb that announces the Englishman on his travels--at
every turn he would hear the language of Shakespeare and of Mr.
Labouchere adorned with a good deal of horse-talk. Coney's Cosmopolitan
Bar, Rue Scribe, is full on this day of betters and bookmakers, and
possibly of Englishmen of a higher rank, whilst its silver
_gril_--which is not of silver, however, but polished so bright as
almost to look like it--smokes with the broiling steak, and the gin
cocktails and brandy-and-soda flow unceasingly. Toward midnight,
especially--after the Salon des Courses has closed its doors--is
Coney's to be seen in its glory. The circus of the Champs Elysees,
where Saturday is the favorite day, makes on this particular Saturday
its largest receipts in the year; the Jardin Mabille is packed; the
very hackney-coachmen wear the independent, half-insolent look that
they have had since morning and will have till the evening of the next
day--unfailing sign in Paris that some great spectacle is impending;
milliners and dressmakers are out of their wits; the world has gone
mad. The restaurant-waiters and the barbers of the Boulevard may
condescend, if you happen to be a regular customer and given to
tipping, to enlighten you on the chances of the respective