PURCHASE OF COLTS. 81 



than follow it to the very letter. Should he fix 

 upon the one which, as he describes him, — 



" Primus et ire viam, et fluvios tentare menaces 

 Audet, et ignoto sese committere ponti," 



he would be pretty certain of having in due time a 

 first-rate hunter, that would turn his tail to no- 

 thing.* Nor should the breeder overlook the poet's 

 advice to keep his young stock well, if he wishes to 

 have them in the high form (and can any thing be 

 finer?) in which the one of his own choice is pre- 

 sented to us in this most splendid passage. 



There are undoubtedly certain advantages at- 

 tending purchasing yearling colts, with the view of 

 making hunters of them. Such only may be se- 

 lected as appear calculated for the country they are 

 intended to cross, and the weights they will be called 

 upon to carry ; whereas, were the master of hounds 

 to depend on the produce of his own mares, he 

 might be disappointed in being able to select the 

 number he would require to replace, in due time, 

 the vacancies which occurred annually in his stud. 

 We should consider the sum of thirty-five or forty 



* The writer of this article recollects " a case in point," as the law- 

 yers say, with reference to this system of purchasing promising colts. 

 A farmer had, amongst others, a yearling colt, which he did not 

 dream of making a hunter of, by reason of his being out of a cart- 

 mare, until, on the hounds running over his farm, he perceived him 

 follow them, which he continued to do till the fox was killed at the 

 end of a long chase. His owner was, in consequence, induced to 

 ride him with hounds, when he became a horse, and a capital hunter 

 he made, in the late Sir Richard Pulerton's hunt, the property of a 

 yeoman of the name of Humphrey Hughes of Altrey, one of the best 

 riders in the said hunt. The writer himself offered seventy pounds 

 for this horse, when he was half worn out, but his offer was refused. 



