128 THE COMPLETE SPORTSMAN 



One good tip Colonel Spongcwell gave me, 

 which I found of inestimable value in later life. 

 Tliis Vv'as to carry a spare horse-shoe in my 

 pocket whenever I went hunting. It was thus 

 possible for me, when I c^ame to a particularly 

 unalluring jump, to dismount and lead my horse 

 round it; and if other sportsmen expressed sur- 

 prise at my apparently pusillanimous behaviour, 

 I had only to hold up the horse-shoe with a 

 melancholy expression, when their scorn was 

 swiftly converted into sympathy. 



It is, as I have already remarked, an un- 

 pardonable offence to appear in the hunting- 

 field in ill-fitting or slovenly attire. When an 

 Australian relative of mine came out for a day 

 with the Pytchley, dressed in a pair of cycling 

 knickerbockers and a scarlet golfing blazer, with 

 a straw hat perched on the back of his head, 

 the Master of that famous pack took his hounds 

 home at once, and very rightly, too. I myself, 

 in younger days, incurred the suspicion of the 

 field, and found myself an object of derision at 

 the covertside, through wearing the knee- 

 buttons of my leather breeches at the side of 

 my leg instead of in froJit, 



It was all in vain that I pointed out to the 

 hunt secretary that the buttons ran into my 

 shin-bone and caused me the most exquisite 

 pain if worn in the correct position. He 



