268 



THE POST AND THE PADDOCK. 



New YearVday, a small granite obelisk, planted 

 round with evergreens, will be erected to mark the 

 spot. The lapse of eleven years has not quenched 

 the fondness with which every Brocklesby man still 

 clings to his memory. Three more keen and steady 

 sportsmen than "Old Will," Charles Uppleby, of 

 Barrow, and Philip Skipworth, of Aylesby, never 

 went to their rest. 



A Devi- sing mare, whose Eclipse sire was imported 

 into Lincolnshire from the royal stud by the late Lord 

 Yarborough, had also the honour of throwing to Pil- 

 grim that mare of Mr. Frank Iles's which won the first 

 steeple-chase (April, 1820) ever run in Lincolnshire. 

 Field Nicholson had just returned from his first sea- 

 son at Melton (where he afterwards shone so brightly 

 as a steeple-chase rider, on Magic, Plunder, &c.), 

 flushed with triumph at having won a small match 

 there on a fourteen-hand pony, and bringing with 

 him a mare which he fancied fit to beat all the 

 Brocklesby Hunt. Tom Brooks, of Croxby, had been 

 a rival of his in riding, from their very boyhood ; they 

 had sat on the same school bench, thinking doubt- 

 less more of foxes than fractions, and then taken their 

 fences, stroke for stroke, for some years before Field 

 graduated in Leicestershire, whither Tom followed 

 him for a season. Field's boasting was not to be 

 borne, and accordingly Tom told him that his animal, 

 who was a magnificent jumper, but slow, was " a nice 

 bagman's mare," and followed up this home-thrust 

 by offering to run him ten miles within a month for 

 50 guineas a-side for the honour of the old county, 

 each to cariy fourteen stone. From Thoresby Mill 

 to Aylesby steeple, with some seventy to eighty 

 fences in it, was the line chosen. Every man, 

 woman, and child that could walk, ride, or drive 

 lined the ten miles, and it seemed as if all the horse- 

 men of Lincolnshire were- drawn up in array at 

 Barton Street. The pair went the first half mile 



