LEAPING. 97 



growth of the thorns as big round as a man's leg, and he 

 will crash through it like a rocket, or get '' hung up " in the 

 attempt ; at the ox-fence with its double ditch, a bank, a pair 

 of hedges, and a stiff, low, oak rail he disdains to turn tail ; 

 but the cold glare of water, \vhich, without an effort, he 

 could skim over in his stride appears to paralyze him. It is 

 a sort of rubicon he may not cross. If the footmarks of a 

 blood-hunter, one such as we find in the Shires, be measured 

 as he gallops over sound turf, it will be found that at every 

 stroke he covers twenty-two feet. At Meerut, North-west 

 Provinces of India, the fourteen hands two inch high 

 Arabian "Champion" covered twenty-one feet at each 

 stride. Yet, strange to say, it not unfrequently happens 

 that a mere ditch of glittering water, over which a boy on a 

 pony ''good at water" would fly with consummate ease, 

 often stops an otherwise perfect fencer. 



It is the naked ugliness of the water that creates this 

 aversion to the water jump, both in the man and in the 

 horse. I have seen a man come down to a willow fringed 

 brook like a bird on the wing, his heart seemingly hardened, 

 but as he nears the chasm, like Bob Acres, the courage 

 oozes out at the fingers' ends ; the horse, only too willing, 

 perhaps, feels and answers the irresolute pair of hands, the 

 gallop getting slower and slower dwindles into a canter, and 

 the two slither and slide into the muddy clay-bottomed brook 

 together, and serve them right. But the same horse and 

 rider will not hesitate one moment if the same expanse of 

 water be fringed and fronted by a thick low hedge, and will 

 clear it in faultless style. People say you cannot go too 

 fast at water ; and to judge by the exhibitions one sees at 

 Islington and other shows this is true ; but I take leave to 

 differ. That horses, unless ridden very freely, are apt to 

 refuse I admit ; it stands to reason also, that to carry a horse 



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