306 The Post and the Paddock. 



guineas. As regards the two latter descriptions, the 

 mares are put to the horse before they are three years 

 old, and don't " lie rest" more than two months in the 

 year ; and, being young, throw strong healthy foals. 

 Still, even when they have plenty of good blood- 

 horses to pick from, farmers are sadly careless what 

 their mares go to. We have too often seen them flock, 

 for the sake of saving a guinea or two, to one of the 

 seventeen hands clothes-horse kind, with legs like 

 stilts, a middle like a tobacco-pipe, and a back of a 

 length which would put him at a premium in the 

 Portsmouth market, where sailors are popularly sup- 

 posed to consider it a great point gained in their 

 equestrian exercises if five can " get on deck" at one 

 time. As to hunters, the great majority are not in 

 the market till they are sufficiently grazed and have 

 their " mouths up ;" but purchasers little think how- 

 many of their " five year olds" are only four, and 

 some little more than three. It is, we regret to say, a 

 notorious fact that this rascally system of " forwarding 

 the mouth," which was first commenced in the North, 

 has struck root very widely of late. 



But a truce to such homilies on the " Night-side of 

 Nature." We must go back once more into North- 

 amptonshire, and say a word on Earl Fitzwilliam's 

 hunting stable-blood, which is principally derived 

 from his Amadis, a powerful staring big-boned horse, 

 but neither very deep nor big in the body. His stock 

 were all very noble-looking and fine-bottomed ; and 

 Patriot, a light-bodied sixteen-hand, whole black with 

 the exception of the near hind-foot, was the flower of 

 the basket. Tom Sebright, who completed his thirty- 

 fifth season at Milton, March, 1857, had only two 

 falls off him during their eleven seasons ; and Patriot 

 roamed about the park at Milton as a superannuated 

 pensioner till he was rising twenty-four. He was 

 wont often to steal close up to the dining-room 

 window, and thrust in his flesh-coloured nose for a 



