An Accident ivith a Cob. 



449 



plantation. Out of the plantation we galloped down a fifty-acre field, towards a brimful, 

 sluggish, not very wide brook. I had a capital start, and as it was a very steep incline — I 

 had been accustomed to hills — away I went, as hard as I could. Before me was only one 

 horseman, a jockey-looking personage on a racehorse-looking animal. When we got within 

 twenty yards of the brook it was over fetlock-deep in stiff clay. The blood horse galloped 

 on, and without an effort took the water in his stride. With spurs in, determined " to do or 

 drown," I pressed on, the cob declining at every yard, until at the brink he dwelt for a 



A WATER JUMT. 



second, and then plunged into the middle. Fortunately the impetus sent us close up to the 

 opposite bank, on which, wet to the waist, I climbed, while the exhausted cob laid his head 

 on a bank of rushes, and there rested, until, apparently refreshed by his cold bath, he answered 

 the pulls of the reins and flicks of the hunting-whip, and struggled out with a great effort. 

 All the field, except the steeplechaser, a farmer with a horse to sell, and myself, had crossed 

 by a cattle-bridge not ten yards out of the line, although out of sight. I rode back, for the 

 day was hopelessly lost, a damper and wiser man, and never afterwards attempted water or 

 stag-hunting on a coarse-bred one, however clever. 



Nothing can convey a better idea of how a big water-jump is cleared by a fine horseman 

 on a fine horse than the following extract from Whyte Melville's " Brooks of Bridlesmere." 

 The speakers are an earl, "whose familiarity with the country now stood him in good stead, 

 1' F !-■ 



