AND TIMES OF JOHN OSBORNE 479 



her next engagement, the journey occupying no less 

 than a month of easy stages. From MicBleham the 

 horses were walked " o'er moss and fell " into Scotland, 

 days, and sometimes weeks, elapsing before the home 

 was reached again. Compare this with travelling in 

 our time, when by our express trains Newmarket is 

 within five hours of Newcastle and eight of Edinburgh. 

 To Lord George Bentinck the credit of utilising, in the 

 year 1836, the travelling van for the conveyance of 

 thoroughbreds is due, but speedy as this innovation was 

 considered on its introduction by that high-souled 

 sportsman, it is snail's work to the modern means of 

 transit. The old trainers did not affect the dandyism 

 of your modern swell " head men." " They were not 

 impeded by portmanteaus of Russian leather, in which 

 might be enclosed changes of a West-End cut, and an 

 assortment of gloves and collars as large and as varied 

 as would be required for the demands of a Regent 

 Street dude." Their superfluous wardrobe consisted of 

 a collar inserted inside the weather-beaten tall hat, and 

 their surtout was represented by a rough and ready 

 topcoat to resist the onslaught of the elements. 

 Holcrof t, in his " Memoirs " of the life, manners, and 

 customs of the stable lads of a bygone age, reveals the 

 hardships that had to be endured— hardships unheard 

 of in the present day. The Buckles, the Chifneys, the 

 Days, the Robinsons, and the Scotts were all brought 

 up in this rough and ready school, and so was John 

 Osborne, for his father and mother were, as has been 

 pointed out, workers, and every "man-jack" of them 

 at Ashgill was not allowed to eat idle bread. " Plenty 

 o' beer, plenty o' beef, plenty o' bread, plenty o' ham, 

 and plenty o' work," was WilHam's — "Brother 

 William " — epitome of life at the old Yorkshire home in 

 the days when the father and the family were 



