36 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER 



Tvhen the weather was more advanced, and the hot 

 weather of April and May set in, the depression and 

 lassitude of the English horse became very apparent, 

 and he was not within stones of himself to undergro 

 fatigue. He became fretful and impatient, and at 

 the action of Bareilly, when stationed in the rear of 

 a troop of horse artillery, I could scarcely get him to 

 approach the guns, and at each discharge he sprang 

 into the air like a rocket, nearly dragging me out 

 of the saddle. The Australian suffered less from 

 nervousness, but he lost condition rapidly, and I was 

 almost obliged to put him out of work entirely by 

 the beginning of May. The Arab horses, on the 

 contrary, did not feel the effects of the heat in the 

 least. As a proof of this I may mention that I had 

 two Arab horses sent up to me from Bombay. They 

 left that town in November, and did not reach me 

 until the day after the final evacuation of Lucknow, 

 about April 20, having been marching continually 

 for five months, and having undergone many vicissi- 

 tudes — being passed from column to column, and 

 making forced marches continually, and being fed 

 irregularly and scantily while left to the care of 

 native syces or grooms. Still, they arrived at Luck- 

 now in perfect trim, and continued to do fast work 

 throughout the hot season, at the end of which 

 period, on my leaving the field, I sold them for 400^. 

 I remember well on one occasion four of my horses 

 had a fair trial, as they, each in their turn, were 



