CHAPTER V. 



The Average Cup. 



So much has already been said concerning the con- 

 ditions and the nature of the Cup contests in the chapter on 

 the Paperchase Cup itself, that it leaves us very little else 

 in the present one than the task of a running comment 

 on the bare records of the Average Cup. The horse 

 that is wanted for the Paperchase Cup is very often 

 the same stamp of animal that a man must have for 

 the Average Cup — though not always ; for, in its way, the 

 latter is a trophy that takes a great deal more winning. The 

 conditions are that the same horse must be ridden by his 

 owner all the way through the season, and when it is 

 considered that there are usually about a dozen chases — 

 equal to a bucketting steeple-chase once a week, in which a 

 horse has to be ridden well up to the front — it will be 

 realised that to get this Cup the horse must be a stout 

 and a sound one, and the sort that does not know how 

 to fall. How many race-horses would come out once 

 a week and gfo a strenuous four to five mile chase over 

 stiffish obstacles, and extremely hard, rough countr}^, 

 and survive to tell the tale ! Three days a fortnight is 

 not supposed to be too much to ask of a hunter at home, 

 but the conditions are so widely different between India and 

 England that it is scarcely possible to draw any parallel. 

 The average hunting man would call us all lunatics to 

 gallop and jump on the ground that we do here, and at 

 home they would not expect their horses to last a week, let 



