MR. FORT, M.F.H. 197 



the KiDg cavilled when he brought the great William 

 to book. But the astute Prelate excused himself on the 

 grounds that the sentence must not be thought to bear 

 the proud interpretation, " Wykeham made this," but the 

 humbler one of, ''This made Wykeham." If Mr. Fort were 

 asked, he would probably say the same of Dear Heart. To 

 ride her was a liberal education in the art of crossing a 

 country. There was nothing that she could not jump, and 

 not even the Styx itself would have made her turn her 

 head, while she had such a turn of speed that she carried 

 her owner first past the post in more than one steeplechase. 

 He has had plenty of good horses since, as most of us must 

 acknowledge, but he is constant to this, his first love, and 

 declares stoutly that she was the best. 



" Every sportsman, they say. 

 In his lifetime has one that outrivals the rest, 

 So the pearl of my casket I've shown you to-day. 

 The gentlest, the gamest, the boldest, the best." 



But it is a curious thing that the best should have also 

 been the first, or almost the first. 



Other good ones have been Al, bought from his 

 brother-in-law, the late Captain Gerard Leigh ; the little 

 blood bay. Peeping Tom, by Pedometer, bought from 

 Captain Spicer, and who went eventually at a high figure 

 to Mr. Peat. The grey Pugilist, still going as well as ever 

 in his sixteenth year, is a wonderful hunter, but as full of 

 antics as any harlequin. These playful ways have lost 

 him many a good place. The Duchess of Hamilton tired 

 of him for one. Mr. Burnaby had him for a bit, and at 

 last Mr. Fort bought him from Stokes. They seem to get 

 on very well together, and Harry Bates, the Master's second 

 horseman, also does not appear to be at all disconcerted by 

 the violent kicks and plunges of an otherwise capital horse. 

 Silver King, too, deserves to be mentioned. A wild old 

 rascal he has always been, but such a fencer ! When 

 Stokes bought him he saw him clear a quickset hedge, a 

 good six feet high, more than once. It was no trouble to 



