160 RIDING RECOLLECTIONS. 



read concerning the difficulty of buying Irish horses in 

 their own country, that there are still scores of them in 

 Cork, Limerick, and other breeding districts, as yet 

 unpromised and unsold. The scarcity of weight-carriers 

 is indisputable, but can we find them here ? The " light 

 man's horse," to fly under sixteen stone, is a " black 

 swan " everywhere, and if not " a light man' horse," 

 that is to say, free, flippant, fast, and well-bred, he will 

 never give his stalwart rider thorough satisfaction ; but 

 in Ireland, far more plentifully than in England, are still 

 to be found handsome, clever, hunting-like animals 

 fit to carry thirteen stone, and capital jumpers at 

 reasonable prices, varying from one to two hundred 

 pounds. The latter sum, particularly if you had it with 

 you in sovereigns, would in most localities insure the 

 " pick of the basket," and ten or twenty of the coins 

 thrown back for luck. 



I have heard it objected to Irish hunters, that they 

 are so accustomed to " double " all their places, as to 

 practise this accomplishment even at those flying fences 

 of the grazing districts which ought to be taken in the 

 stride, and that they require fresh tuition before they 

 can be trusted at the staked-and-bound or the bull- 

 finch, lest, catching their feet in the growers as in a 

 net, they should be tumbled headlong to the ground. I 



