FIFTY YEARS OF A SHOWMAN'S LIFE 



and also one of his servants for assault and illegal 

 detention. During the hearing of the case, it 

 transpired that " Lawyer " H. had, in the excite- 

 ment of the battle, carried off, in error, one of the 

 second party of horsemen, who had not been on 

 the land in question at all. Hence, he had no case 

 as to the trespass, whilst he was fined twenty 

 shillings and costs for his own and ten shillings 

 and costs for his servant's share in the assault and 

 detention. One of the adjudicators was Dr. 

 Marsham, Warden of Merton College, who, in view 

 of the particularly good friend he always was to 

 hunting, must have derived peculiar enjoyment 

 from assisting to hoist the engineer with his own 

 petard. 



The memory of the contretemps which this 

 attempt to take the law into his own hands re- 

 sulted in rankled in the discomfited one's bosom, 

 more especially on account of the unsympathetic 

 merriment it everywhere gave rise to. Hence, 

 he was for ever on the look-out for an opportunity 

 to exact retribution. And this provided a dramatic 

 sequel to the trespassing story. 



One day, when the Prince of Wales was out 

 with the South Oxfordshire hounds, and sport 

 was not of the best, his Royal Highness, with one 

 of his equerries, Colonel Keppel, and two or three 

 undergraduate friends, took a ride across country, 

 and, all unthinkingly, came on to " Lawyer " H.'s 

 land, finishing up by riding into his farm-yard, 

 with the intent to take a short cut through it. 

 No sooner, however, had the horsemen got into 

 the yard, than H., who was on the watch, had 

 the gate at each end promptly closed and guarded 



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