148 Cross Country with Horse and Hound 



had better stop using it. If spirits excite them to a tension 

 that leaves them more languid and unstrung than before, 

 he may know by that sign that these things also are a 

 hindrance. 



A run, sir, will please you far better than wine ; 

 The farther you gallop, the better you '11 dine. 



It is a lamentable sight indeed to see a man with nerves 

 so weak that he must needs get half drunk before he has 

 nerve enough to ride to hounds. I am not going to preach, 

 but simply to caution. *^ Stimulants of any kind, — except 

 exercise, fresh air, wholesome food, and sound sleep, — 

 while they may produce a temporary effect, only make a 

 man's nerves weaker than they were before. It is really a 

 nauseating sight to see a man in the hunting-field ** getting 

 his spirits up by putting spirits down," open confession as 

 it is of weakness, fear, and funk. 



There are all degrees of courage. Bravery and courage 

 have a common ancestry in nerve. Recklessness, heedless- 

 ness, and daredevilry, on the contrary, are born of fool- 

 hardiness, which is the utter absence of courage. Some 

 men and more women, I believe, perform feats in the hunt- 

 ing-field which pass for nerve or courage, but which, when 

 we come to analyse them, we find due entirely to the 

 absence of these qualities. There can certainly be no 

 courage where no danger is felt or seen ; nerves that are 

 insensible to pain are not nerves. 



That many men and women ride to hounds with cour- 

 age and nerve in a sort of cataleptic state, there can be no 



