248 RIDING RECOLLECTIONS. 



to my own taste, though perhaps in this my reader 

 may not agree with me, they would be more inviting 

 were they not separated by such forbidding fences. A 

 high black-thorn hedge, strong enough to hold an 

 elephant, with one, and sometimes two ditches, fortified, 

 moreover, in many cases, by a rail placed half a horse's 

 length off to keep out cattle from the thorns, offers, 

 indeed, scope for all the nobler qualities of man and 

 beast, but while sufficiently perilous for glory, seems to 

 my mind rather too stiff for pleasure ! 



And yet I have seen half-a-dozen good men well- 

 mounted live with hounds over this country for two or 

 three miles on end without a fall, nor do I believe that 

 in these stiffly fenced grazing grounds the average of 

 dirty coats is greater than in less difficult-looking dis- 

 tricts. It may be that those who compete are on the 

 best of hunters, and that a horse finds all his energies 

 roused by the formidable nature of such obstacles, if he 

 means to face them at all ! 



And now a word about those casualties which perhaps 

 rather enhance than damp our ardour in the chase. Mr. 

 Assheton Smith used to say that no man could be called 

 a good rider who did not know how to fall. 



Founded on his own exhaustive experience there is 

 much sound wisdom in this remark. The oftener a man 



