alled a happy one. It may be, however, that the duke's selection of the
site was determined by its proximity to the luxuriant valley of the
Auge, so famous for its excellent pasturage and for the number of its
stables. The Victor stud belonging to M. Aumont, that of Fervacques, the
property of M. de Montgomery, and the baron de Rothschild's
establishment at Meautry, are all in the immediate neighborhood of
Deauville; but even these advantages do not compensate for the
unfavorable character of the track, laid out, as we have said, upon land
from which the sea had receded, and which, as might have been expected,
was sure to be hard and cracked in a dry season. To remedy this most
serious defect, and to bring the ground to its present degree of
excellence, large sums had to be expended. The aspect of the race-course
to-day, however, is really charming. A rustic air has been given to the
stands, the ring, even to the stables that enclose the paddock, but it
is a rusticity quite compatible with elegance, like that of the pretty
Norman farm in the garden of Trianon. The purse for two-year-olds used
to be called, under the Empire, the Prix Morny, but this name was
withdrawn at the same time that the statue of the duke, which once stood
in Deauville, was pulled down.

Our Norman circuit comes to a close with the races at Dieppe, which
finished last year on the 26th of August. Dieppe was celebrated during
the Empire for its steeple-chases, which were run upon a somewhat hilly
ground left almost in its natural state--a very unusual thing in France.
The flat- and hurdle-races which have succeeded to these since the war
are not of sufficient importance to detain us.

Returning from this agreeable summer jaunt, in which the pleasures of
sea-bathing have added a zest to the enjoyment of the race-course, the
followers of the turf will seek, on coming back to Paris in the early
days of September, the autumn meetings at Fontainebleau and at
Longchamps. But they will not find the paddock of the latter at this
season of the year bustling with the life and fashion that gave it such
brilliancy in the spring, and the "return from the races" is made up of
little else than hired cabs drawn by broken-down steeds. It is just the
period when Paris, crowded with economical strangers, English or
German--the former on their return, perhaps, from Switzerland, the
latter enjoying their vacation after their manner--mourns the absence of
her own gay wo