Dick Christians Lecture. 3 5 1 



him back. I got pretty well called for that : that put 

 my blood up a bit. Then away we went to Scalford 

 Brook, but the hounds didn't cross it : up comes my 

 gentleman, and says, quite angrily, " Why didn't you 

 jump the brook ?" I told him, because the hounds didn't 

 cross ; he said they did, and I said they didn't. I got 

 as savage as blazes, and I told him, before all the 

 gentlemen, that if I didn't know his horse would kill 

 some one, I'd get off and turn him loose, and that I'd 

 never ride another horse for him as long as I lived. 

 He asked the groom, when he got to his stable, if I'd 

 left any message ; and he says, " Yes, sir ; he tells me 

 he won't ride another horse for you." " The deuce he 

 did !" I kept my word for a twelvemonth, and then 

 we made it up : he was always very kind to me but 

 that time. A man can't be put on when he's gone 

 every yard with hounds. 



It would be in '41 when I left Melton. I lived at 

 Lord Scarboro's in the house at Rufford, every year 

 from October to May, for fifteen years : I was to have 

 gone again this year, but Lord Scarboro' died. It's 

 been hard lines with me since that. I broke all his 

 young horses for my lord ; they would have cantered 

 the figure of 8 in this room. He was a very particu- 

 lar man was Lord Scarboro', with his horses ; if he 

 ever saw a horse walking with the wrong leg first, 

 he'd always call to the groom to make him change. 

 I had a mint of troubles there. Captain Williams 

 and I jumped a lock ; it looked as deep as a coal-pit. 

 " Dick," says he when we killed, " what did you think 

 of that lock jump ?" " I thought nothing of it, sir," 

 I said. " Well, I did, Dick, for I shut my eyes going 

 over." He enjoyed that, did the Captain : he was 

 only on a four-year-old mare : she's gone to Voltigeur 

 this spring. 



Talk of tumbles ! I have had eleven in one day 

 down there, when I was above seventy : I'll never see 

 seventy-eight again, but I can take a good allowance 



