Iris a curious arrangement that while the first half of the yenr is well sup-lied with holidays, New-Year, China New-Year, Easter, and Spring Race Meeting, the latter half has only the Autumn Race Meeting and Christmas, and there are no public holidays between the two race meetings, though the Banks and the Customs have here and. there days which occasionally coincide, while for the laborious journalist there is no holiday at all between Easter and Christmas, The Autumn holiday has now passed, and passed on the whole ver successfully, with fine weather, excellent racing, enough certainties confated to make it exciting, and a brilliant company gathered from all the foreign communities in China, from Peking in the North to Hongkong in the South. While a large sum of money in the aggregate changes hands during the three days' racing, $117,720—a record amount—having passed through the parimutuel without counting the sweeps and lotteries, the money circulates all the time and does not lodge in large sums in special spots. The winner of to-day is the loser of tomorrow, and it is rare now-a-days for the close of the meeting to show large sums lost or won by avy individual. Success is much more evenly distributed than it was some years ago when the tactics of one large stable seemed to threaten with collapse what should be always and is now essentially amateur sport. The presence of the garrison in Shanghai added decidedly to the interest of the meeting, and that the officers remain here will be an alleviation of
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.