1 6 6 A mong Men and Ho rses. 



shoe, with which English veterinary surgeons try to alleviate 

 the pain of laminitis, in full working order at the end of a 

 female leg. Its ground surface, like that of its iron counter- 

 part, was curved, so that the sufferer could keep constantly 

 changing the seat of pain. 



The fact of there being a Government House in Hong 

 Kong, causes, like in Calcutta, a line of social demarcation to 

 be drawn between retail and wholesale tradesmen. In 

 Shanghai, there is no Governor to set the exiles by the ears ; 

 consequently the white men of the ' Model Settlement ' live in 

 harmony and social equality. In fact, I never met a body of 

 men who pulled so well together, and were so helpful to each 

 other. For instance, there is that genial companion and good 

 sportsman, Tom Fourinhand, who went home some years ago 

 to have a twelve months' holiday, hunting in the shires, rac- 

 ing during the summer, and doing himself well, at the rate of 

 20 a day. ,When he returned full of health and spirits, he 

 found that his father-in-law and partner had, during his 

 absence, burst up the firm in a vain attempt to improve the 

 breed of herrings on the China coast. Did Tom set his face 

 as a flint, and start afresh as a junior clerk, with the un- 

 daunted purpose in his heart of becoming the head of the 

 house before he was two hundred years of age ? Or did he 

 sit down, wring his hands, and drink himself slowly but 

 pleasantly to death ? Neither the one nor the other alterna- 

 tive did he accept ; but like a proper member of the Hong 

 (Anglice, place) he went to the Club at the orthodox hour of 

 twelve to have a cocktail with one, a ' pint ' with another, and 

 so on, until he had all his old pals around him. They, being 

 practical men, at once set their remaining wits to work in the 

 endeavour to help their old friend, and, before the merry 

 meeting broke up, they had settled that he was to be made 

 official handicapper of the Race Club, the programmes of which 

 never contain a weight-alloted race, on a stipend that now 

 keeps him going at a very fair rate of speed. Besides enjoy- 

 ing this sinecure, Tom does a bit of brokering, a business 



