"FOLLY AS IT FLIES." 231 



one at the season when whistles were in demand ; 

 paid a proportionate price for it; has blown it till 

 whistles are no longer in demand ; and, forgetting 

 it is but a whistle, is greatly surprised to find he is 

 likely to pay rather dear for his music. 



Mais revenons a nos moutons. We left the owner 

 strenuously urging the dealer to purchase, and the 

 latter as assiduously endeavouring to get out of the 

 affair. Let us suppose that the owner loses if he 

 sells the horse on whom should the fault rest ? 

 Certainly not on the dealer. If a Nobleman or 

 Gentleman is content to buy such a horse for his 

 use as is driven by a hundred other Noblemen and 

 Gentlemen, from a hundred to a hundred and fifty 

 would have been probably the maximum price. Such 

 a horse, making allowance for the time of year in 

 which he might be offered for sale, would always 

 command something close upon the same price : but 

 if any person is determined to possess any rarity, no 

 matter of what sort, and afterwards wishes to dis- 

 possess himself of it, he must either find a purchaser 

 among those who are on the look-out for rarities, or 

 make up his mind to pay dearly for his temporary 

 possession of it. The dealer naturally declines buy- 

 ing what he knows he must lose money by; and no 

 blame can be attached to him for so doing. The owner 

 forgets, in wishing to sell his horse, that he partly does 

 so because people of fashion are leaving London, and 

 that he is doing so himself: he forgets, that instead 

 of giving without a murmur three hundred for this 

 same horse, he would not purchase him at the 

 time he wants to sell him at even half the original 

 price; he ought to consider that others would feel 

 the same thing; and that the dealer, aware that 



Q 4 



