Related article: first prizes himself, and to see two of the three others carried off by the late Mr. Colman's animals, both bred by him. One was the Norwich winner " May," and the other a steer named Master Har- binger, of the same Angus- Shorthorn cross. Nor did their triumphs end here, for the steer was selected as the best of his sex in the Show, and took the £so Cup accordingly. The cross- bred heifer, good as she was, could not hold her own against Lord Strathmore's *• Ju-ju" and Mr. Learner's Shorthorn, and it was no more than what was ex- pected when Buy Epivir-Hbv " Ju-ju " was awarded the ;f 50 Cup lor heifers, and then came out triumphant from the final competition for the Champion Plate and the Chal- lenge Cup. She has, in fact, achieved just the same series of victories which another Glamis heifer of the same breed won two years ago, and she has won ;^3oo in money and four Challenge Cups of the nominal value of nearly ;^5oo. This is not a bad fort- night's work, and the Welsh butcher who -bought her will not see his money back by what her meat brings, but it is a very effec- tive sort of advertisement. The sheep were about the same in numbers and quality that they have been for several years, and the exclusion of Epivir-Hbv Price the classes for ewes was generally approved of, while the scanty support accorded to the long-wooUed classes sug- gests the advisability of omitting them altogether, as the money always goes into the same hands. The Southdowns were nume- rously represented, but it did not strike one that they were anything out-of-the-way good, though the late Mr. Colman's pen of sheath- ing wethers well deserved the Cup as the best of the breed. And here I may open a parenthesis to remark that the late Mr. Col- man's executors won the Cups for the best Crossbred, the best Red Poll and the best Southdowns, to say nothing of the £s^ Cup for the best steer or ox, and six first prizes in the six classes where they were represented. Mr. Col- man's Southdowns were, of course, in the fight for the Prince of Wales* Challenge Cup, but here they had to knuckle under to a fine i>en of Shropshires exhibited by Mr. Philo Mills, and among other sheep which came well out of the comp)etition were some Dorset Horns sent by Mr. M'Calmont from his Hereford- shire estate. The pigs, of which Mr. Pricker's pen of Berkshires was selected for the Duke of York's Cup, looked as toothsome as to me they always do, but for anyone who is anxious to get up an appetite, 70 BAILY S MAGAZINE. [Jaxuait commend me to the show of table poultry, which, thanks to Sir Walter Gilbey, Mr. Tegetmeier and Mr. C. £. Brooke, has gone on improving each year, and bids fair to make us independent of French methods of fattening and preparing birds for the spit. Another interesting and useful addition to the Show is the sec- tion known as the " carcase " competition, for, competent as the judges appointed to take the live- stock classes may be, they cannot possibly tell exactly what is the proportion of lean and fat meat the different animals carry, and it seems a self-evident proposition that when they are slaughtered and their carcases exhibited and weighed, the decision arrived at must be more correct. It took some time, however, to get the block-test re-introduced at the Smithfield Club, even in a modi- fied form, but the entries, despite the moderate prizes, have gone on increasing, and there can be no doubt that it has already done good, for if the sheep sent this time were still fat — too fat — they were not quite such a mass of blubber as at the first two or three competitions, while the beef showed a decided improvement. So that the Show, taken all round, was of at least average interest, and it is to be hoped that Lord Winterton, • who succeeds the Prince of Wales as President for this year, and who was to have been succeeded by the late Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild, will find the Smithfield Club em- barking not less auspiciously upon its second century. Other Christmas Shows. — " The greatest Show on Earth." Wild animals, horses, acrobats, freaks, and all, have arrived at Olympia, and long before these lines will have been read will have given their first performance. There is huge company, and a great stock of properties, wfaik novelties will be found not to have been neglected. Then Heir Wolff opened at the Crystal Palace on Boxing Day. His circus is as complete as usual, and he has several exceedingly well- trained liberty horses. Time was when there were three circuses running at once in London, but now for some reason or other she hardly appears equal to supporting one. With the closing of Astley's the taste for a circus seems to have partly died out, though at the Crystal Palace Herr WolflTs enter- tainment draws good audiences during its short season. A Great Billiard Match.- Every reader of Baily, who takes even the most superficial interest in our great indoor pastime, ^ill welcome the announcement that articles of agreement have at length been signed by John Roberts and Charles Dawson, for a match at billiards on equal terms, a subject, it will be remembered, of much paper warfare a year ago. Never since June, 1885, when he defeated Joseph Bennett in the last match ever played for the Championship on the now obsolete championship table, has John Roberts met an opponent on even terms, though it will not be for- gotten that W. J. Peall has re- peatedly challenged him, without response, to a level match "all- in," the game, until the recent passing of the Revised Rules, of English billiards. Such a really sporting and genuine encounter as the money match under notice can hardly fail to excite intense public interest, whatever may be the popular opinion, based on the ** public form " of the contracting parties, as to its result. The terms of Dawson's chal- lenge, viz. J ** to play under the Rules of the Billiard Association, IS99.] SPORTING INTELLIGENXE.