ARD PATRICK 121 



hear from him again, but by a marvellous recuperative 

 power he had come back to something like himself 

 when I returned and wrote me a cheery letter, sending 

 a sample of his winter oats and saying he would let me 

 have all that Marsh and his sons, Sam and Fred, did 

 not want. I replied that I would gladly take them, and 

 asked if it would be convenient that I should motor to 

 Beckhampton to see him. He replied that Mrs Darling 

 was ill and hoped I would come a week or two later, 

 but by that time his revival had proved to be a flash in 

 the pan, and there was no further hope. I never saw 

 him again. 



But this does not prevent me from harking back to 

 the spring of 1903, when, with Sam Darling and the 

 late Mr John Gubbins, I went to Egypt and up the 

 Nile as far as Assouan. We were booked to go as far 

 as Khartoum, but they soon got fed up with seeing 

 temples and tombs and made excuse that I had got 

 a touch of fever to cancel the tickets for the further 

 route. 



How Mr Gubbins became afflicted with gout before 

 we got away from Egypt, and how I had another go 

 of fever may be mentioned here, but not dilated on. 

 Fever or no fever, I had it in mind to get Mr Gubbins 

 to put a price on Ard Patrick, and before we reached 

 England he agreed to sell him for 20,000 guineas, if 

 he might retain the right to run him for the Princess of 

 Wales' Stakes and the Eclipse Stakes. 



So far so good ; but the late Count Lehndorff a right 

 good man, Prussian or no proved very difficult to 

 persuade in this matter, though he badly wanted Ard 

 Patrick for the Graditz Stud. He knew that the colt 

 had seriously strained one of his tendons in the new 



