116 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER. 



the tabunshicks the wildest dare-devils that can be 

 imagined ; so much so, that it is considered a settled 

 point, that a man who has had the care of horses for 

 two or three years, is unfit for any quiet, or settled 

 kind of life. No one, of course, that can gain a 

 tolerable livelihood in any other way, will embrace a 

 calling that subjects him to so severe a life ; and the 

 consequence is, that it is generally from among the 

 scamps of a village that servants are raised for this 

 service. They are seldom without money, and when 

 they do visit the brandy-shop, they are not deterred 

 from abandoning themselves to a carouse by the 

 financial considerations likely to restrain most men 

 in the same rank of life. They ought, it is true, never 

 to quit the taboon for a moment, but they will often 

 spend whole nights in the little brandy-houses of the 

 Steppe, drinking and gambling, and drowning in then- 

 fiery potations all recollections of the last day's 

 endurance. When their senses return with the 

 returning day, they gallop after their herds, and 

 display no little ingenuity in repairing the mischief 

 that may have accrued from the carelessness of the 

 preceding night. 



The tabunshick lives in constant dread of the 

 horse-stealer, and yet there is hardly a tabunshick on 

 the Steppe that will not steal a horse if occasion 



