140 ^ SHOEING. 



and re-echoed from servant to smithy and 

 smith to servant ; while the poor animal be- 

 comes the subject of passive obedience ; for 

 whether 'well or til shod, pricked or lamed, is 

 a matter of indifference to all parties except 

 the owner, who being thus acknowledged so 

 despicable a character^ no one feels for his 

 <]isquietude or misfortunes, but exultingly 

 exclaims, that what*s too bad for another is 

 too good for him. 



Such characters as these are not the pro^ 

 lific effect of a fertile imagination, but exact 

 pictures of objects the produce of every 

 soil. No gratification of ambition, no per- 

 sonal ostentation, can be indulged in the 

 present discrimination, by arraigning the 

 disgraceful want of liberality in others, or 

 vainly endeavouring to extol my own : it 

 is, however, matter of the most unsullied 

 exultation, that such accusation has never 

 been known to reach the hospitable hall 

 of a Sportsman's Habitation ; their 

 universally admitted generosity, calculated 

 ypon the principle of self-preservation, 

 stands much more in need of the curb 

 than the spi^r, the general tenor of every 



