My First Steeple-chaser. 77 



something to see the polite way in which he addressed me, as I 

 turned away, just as if he had never seen me before : "If you're 

 quite done, sir, perhaps I can try and deal." His lameness cer- 

 tainly did not interfere with his equestrian powers, when once he 

 was firm in his saddle, and although he was obliged to ride two 

 holes shorter on his left stirrup-leather than his right, and used only 

 a single spur, with which he was continually higgling at his horse's 

 side, he had such a marvellous knack, to use poor old Dick Chris- 

 tian's words, "of catching 'em up and putting 'em at it," that he 

 was generally in his place. I may mention that Dick Christian was 

 a perfect oracle with the old man j and " if Christian only had that 

 horse for twenty minutes from Ashby pastures, he'd sell him to a 

 swell for a little fortune," was constantly in his mouth. Not that 

 he used to risk his neck upon every " casualty hoss " that passed 

 through his hands : the nephew did the rough work, and when he 

 had taken the sharp edge off the screw, the uncle drove it home. 

 He could probably have, afforded to ride as good a nag as any man in 

 the hunt ; but the love for a screw was born in him, and he owned 

 candidly that he never cared to buy a horse whose value every 

 dealer could tell to $1. Always chopping and changing, swopping 

 and higgling, he was never seen half a dozen times on the same 

 horse ; and I once heard him lament, when he was completing a 

 little chop, after his old principle of drawing as much to boot as 

 both the screws were worth, " It's very hard : I never get a horse 

 that suits me but some one comes and takes a fancy to him, and 

 I'm fool enough always to part with him." Of course the word 

 "warranty " was not to be found in his vocabulary, for, as he told 

 me, he never but once in his life warranted a horse sound, and that 

 was returned on his hands ; so what was the use of a man's word in 

 horse-dealing ? Still there was nothing of the low dealer or coper 

 about him. Scrupulously neat and clean in his dress and appear- 

 ance, his manners, whenever he could sink the shop, fitted him for 

 any company. I never heard an oath or a coarse word pass his 

 lips; his pew in the little village church' was never vacant on the 

 Sunday morning 5 and, strange as it may appear in one of his trade, 



