THE GROOM i;j'j 



stands exonerated. Grooms, hunting ones in particular, may 

 rely upon it that gentlemen know the price and value of most 

 things just as well as they do, and it does not follow because 

 a master is not always storming or kicking up a row that he 

 does not observe what is wrong. A dishonest servant is sure 

 to " catch it '■ sooner or later. 



But if we deprecate the country inn yard, what shall we 

 say to the abomination of some London livery stable ones. 

 Why, in the words of the author of the " Young Groom's 

 Guide and Valet's Directory," that a few weeks at such places 

 has been the ruin of many a young man. There is nothing, 

 writes he, " but drinking, tossing, colting, &c., going on from 

 morning to night ; it begins, as Blacky says, by drinking for 

 dry, and then comes drinking for drinky, and so on to the end 

 of the chapter." Purl the first thing in the morning before 

 their eyes are hardly open ; porter at lunch, porter at dinner, 

 and again a double dose at night. Then, there they are the 

 next morning, some with a splitting head-ache ; some so sick 

 and squeamish that nothing but a hair of the same dog will 

 cure them ; and the cry is, " d— n it, I cannot do my work 

 without my half-pint of ' purl." Well, away they go for this 

 precious stuff, and, at the corner, probably meet with some 

 more ' purl drinkers ; ' and then it is nothing but tossing up 

 and tossing down, till they return back, half stupefied and 

 muddled before they begin their work, and are soon obliged to 

 take another draught to (juench the thirst and fever produced 

 by the first." 



That is a sad picture, but we do not believe an overdrawn 

 one of some of these places, and masters should pause ere they 

 consign a lad to such a scene of temptation. 



One of the most important duties of a Hunting Groom 

 is taking horses out over night, and making the best of bad 

 stables. Fourteen miles is as far as a horse should go from 



