388 A RARE ONE. 



our best countries : but the talk that is made of such 

 an occurrence shows its rarity, and that such a horse, 

 like a comet, as King Harry said, is " wondered at." 

 This, however, I will say, was I living in a thickly 

 enclosed country, I certainly would come over to 

 Ireland to buy hunters : for such horses to scramble 

 through dirt 1 never saw ; from what I have heard of 

 Bedfordshire, I should say they would be invaluable 

 there. 



In calling the Irish horse slow, I hope it will be 

 understood that I am speaking of him generally, and 

 relatively as to such horses as cross our fast countries ; 

 I do not mean he is slow in a heavy one, on the con- 

 trary, there he is fast: this and leaping is his forte, 

 and here his peculiar stoutness does wonders. But 

 when we speak of a first burst from a gorse cover in a 

 turf country, we should also speak of racing pace. 



Whether what I should term fair hunting is im- 

 proved by hounds being bred so fast, I leave others 

 to determine : at all events we kill a fox the sooner 

 by it. But this much I know, that I have seen many 

 come up after a fox had been eaten, and speak in 

 raptures of the pace, and the burst, of which they had 

 seen but little at first, and, towards the end, nothing. 

 Now I must say, that so circumstanced I should be 

 any thing but enraptured ; and should I fear have 

 wished either the hounds or my horse at the d 1. 



Thus I wrote some fifteen or sixteen years ago, and 

 many of my sporting friends were pleased to say 

 they considered what I said was tolerably correct. 

 Since that time a very considerable alteration, and, I 

 am most happy to add, very great improvement has 

 been made in breeding in Ireland, both as regards 

 their race-horses and hunters ; indeed, the latter is a 



