72 My First Steeple-chaser, 



It is certainly now many years since I had anything to do with 

 this class of horse, but I must confess that once on a time I never 

 grumbled to give 15/. or 20/. for a good-looking "screw," when I 

 should have thought twice about 35/. or 40/. for a horse which I 

 knew was all right. This dealing in screws is, however, after all, 

 a dangerous and expensive taste to indulge in, for I really do think 

 that it brings a man into fellowship with more of the pariahs and 

 outcasts of the sporting world than any other. No one can deny 

 that it is the very lowest step in the horse-dealer's ladder. Sporting 

 butchers, broken-down dealers, rough-riders, even the very cads of 

 the stable, can all meet on an equality in this game, and all distinc- 

 tions are levelled by the talismanic go-between of the screw. 



Now mind, by screws, I do not mean old, worn-out rips, which 

 have gradually passed through every phase in a horse's existence, 

 worked hard in all, and at length become worn out in the service — ■ 

 nor the horrid screw you see in the hands of a blackgTiard coper 

 at a country fair, but I mean the real " casualty horse " (and I do 

 think no name can be more appropriate than this for the class of 

 horse which I am describing), still in his prime, who shows good 

 points and good breeding, but who has been disabled or blemished 

 in his youth 3 perhaps has broken down in training, or been thrown 

 up on account of his temper, or some unlucky accident or latent 

 disease, which has baffled the keenest of the faculty, yet being too 

 good or too handsome to be knocked on the head, he has been sold 

 out of the stud probably for a 10/. note, with all his faults, and 

 found his way into the hands of a man of whom there are dozens in 

 every hunt, who having but little money, yet rare eyes to the good 

 points of a horse, and who, with an intuitive love for a screw, 

 always prefers seeing the beginning of a run in a good place, on a 

 raking, showy, unsound bit of blood, than the finish of it, on a 

 steady, sound old hunter. The great ambition of such a man is to 

 •endeavour to find out where the fault really lies which has baffled 

 so much veterinary lore, and his waking and sleeping thoughts are 

 concentrated upon his screw- no matter if the horse has only three 

 legs to go upon, the hidden nugget lies in the fourth; and visions of 



