WITH THE KILLING KILDARES. 109 



done than a black eye from a blow with the side of 

 a hoof. I shall always think of him with gratitude, 

 but why oh, why did he slip the girths instead of 

 pulling the stirrup leather out of the bar ? Once I 

 was on my feet the others, of course, rode on, and 

 it took me minutes to girth up the impatient little 

 beast. So that at all events was not the best run I 

 saw in Kildare. 



Then there was a day of another sort, when a fox 

 from Copeland's Gorse gave us a hunting run of no 

 less than an hour and three-quarters, beating us 

 handsomely at last among the mountains on the 

 Wicklow side of the country. To make open con- 

 fession, I was funking sadly that day, and cannot 

 claim to have been " in it." I may urge the ex- 

 tenuating circumstance that I was riding the same 

 mare who had given me the above-mentioned fall, 

 and who, though a wonderful timber -jumper, was 

 just a little rash for Kildare. 



"A more sthragglin' hunt Oi nivir saw in me loife," 

 criticised a stalwart son of the soil whom we passed 

 after running over an hour, and I fear I was among 

 the " sthragglers " that day. 



"A run," said Mr. Jorrocks,^ (and who can write 

 of fox-hunting without quoting him ?) " a run is either 

 a buster elbows and legs throughout or it's sharp at 

 first and slow artorwards or it is slow at first and 

 sharp arterwards." I have just glanced at one of the 

 former class and at one of the second. I think, how- 

 ever, that the best run I saw with the Kildares was 



* " Handley Cross." Chap, xxxiii., p. 265, Original Edition. 



