The Best Fourteen-Hander in England. 187 



an interest in a pony belonging to a friend. There was nothing 

 very aristocratic about the looks of the throng, but there was some- 

 thing truly British ; and many a cordial shake of the hand did I 

 receive as I elbowed my way through the crowd to look for my old 

 friend, who I knew had arrived that afternoon, and was somewhere 

 about the premises. 



Whilst pushing my way through the crowded inn passage I ran 

 against a man who was forcing his way out, and whom I instantly 

 recognised as one "Joe Cox," by some considered the biggest 

 blackguard in our parts. As soon as he saw me he seized me by 

 the arm, dragged me out again into the inn yard, and when we 

 were clear of the listeners, accosted me thus : " You're the very 

 man I was looking for, sir. If you want to buy the best fourteen- 

 hander in England, now's your time." 



I mast, before proceeding with my tale, introduce Mr. Joe Cox 

 to the reader. He was, to use the words of my old friend, a very 

 " equivocal" sort of character, and the very last man in the world 

 to part with the sort of horse he had just named, if he luckily 

 owned such a treasure, which was very unlikely. 



He was a low, horse-coping kind of a fellow j a stout, muscular, 

 goodish-looking man, of about thirty-five, who kept a little beer- 

 shop, the "Crooked Billet," on the edge of "Merry Sherwood," 

 the resort of all the broken-down horse-dealers, poachers, sheep- 

 stealers, and vagabonds in the neighbourhood. He was a man 

 possessed of considerable acquirements, such as they were a capital 

 iudge of a horse, and a rare bruising rider for his weight. He was 

 an excellent pigeon-shot, and an incorrigible poacher ; could fight, 

 wrestle, throw a quoit, play the tambourine, and kick a football 

 with any man in Nottinghamshire 3 was renowned throughout the 

 county for his breed of terriers, game-cocks, and ferrets, and, as he 

 was just the sort of fellow who could be very useful to country 

 gentlemen of certain tastes, and was, moreover, hardly the man one 

 would care willingly to offend, he was in a certain degree patronized 

 by many. Although not exactly what we should call a " steady 

 character," Joe was not a bad sort in his way, and would go any 



