The Best Four teen- Han der in England. 217 



who could ride her. I had heard his last instructions to the jockey 

 as he threw him up into the saddle : " None of your half lengths. 

 Take the lead and keep it the whole way round, and win by as far 

 as ever you can." 



Not one of the other jockeys seemed to take the least notice of 

 Bessy Bedlam, as she went sailing along with her head down, 

 gaining at every stride. They sat watching one another, naturally 

 concluding that she had bolted with the lad, and must soon come 

 back to them. But they were reckoning without their host. The 

 long, lurching stride of the one-eyed mare soon began to tell, and 

 long before they had covered a mile the tailing had begun. When 

 they came into the distance, she was at least ten lengths ahead, the 

 boy sitting with his hands down, as quiet as a statue. The 

 Rejected, to my old friend's mortification, had shot her bolt, and 

 only four were now in the race, except the one-eyed mare. The 

 Cambridge and the Belper ponies now came away, and made a last 

 effort to close in with Bessy Bedlam. But it was useless, she 

 neither slackened nor increased her speed, but shot past the post 

 alone, and pulled up as cool as if she had only been taking a common 

 canter. 



My old friend was thunderstruck, and so were a good many more 5 

 and all declared that they had never seen the Hollerton Cup won in 

 this fashion before. 



A hurdle race followed j we got a post entrance, and won this 

 nearly as easily as the cup; and a match for 2$l. against the Belper 

 mare made her third victory on that day. 



When she was led off the course, we could hardly get near her 

 for the crowd, and she went hobbling off, with her head down, after 

 her old style, apparently as ready to begin again as when she first 

 came on to the course in the morning. The trainer was as quiet 

 as the mare, merely observing, " I told you how it would be, sir." 

 And as for the lad, he never spoke a word, but quietly set to work 

 with the mare as soon as he got her into the loose-box, without at 

 all seeming to fancy that he was entitled to any praise for the share 

 which he had borne in the day's performance. 



The mare was certainly mine to all intents and purposes, but I 



