194 Ikfnos of tbe Ibunttng^iftelt) 



Hunt, and in the midst of a quick thing, whilst swerving 

 to avoid a horseman who had come to grief at a fence 

 in front of him, he struck against the branch of a tree, 

 was knocked backwards over the tail of his horse, and 

 fell heavily on his back and shoulders. For a moment 

 he was stunned, and when he was lifted up was evidently 

 in great pain, but he insisted on remounting, and after 

 a draught of vinegar, from a flask of that acid liquor 

 which he always carried in cases of accidents, rode on to 

 the finish. ' It is contrary to my practice to go home 

 after a fall,' he said to those who urged him strongly to 

 leave the field. ' I've always found that it is best 

 after a spill to keep the blood in circulation by riding.' 

 So he went resolutely on, and was in at the death of the 

 second fox they killed. But subsequent examination 

 proved that three of his ribs were broken. 



The worst accident, however, that befel him was not 

 in the hunting-field but on the railway. On a dark 

 night he stepped out of the train without noticing that 

 it had stopped before reaching the platform. He fell 

 on the rails, and was picked up senseless, with both 

 collar bones broken. Yet, as soon as he recovered 

 consciousness, he declined to allow himself to be put to 

 bed at the house of a friend to which he had been 

 carried, but insisted on being driven in his own pony 

 carriage over the rutty country lanes to his own home, 

 eight miles distant ; he said the jolting kept the blood 

 from congealing ! 



As a crowning tribute to his sterling qualities, Tom 

 Smith was elected High Sheriff of Hampshire, and 

 worthily filled the post. For his talents were not by 

 any means confined to the hunting-field. It was he 

 who first proposed the scheme of a Thames Embank- 



