NERVE. 245 



afraid, Sir," replied the Colonel," and if you were as 

 much afraid as I am, you would rttn away /" It may, 

 however, be consoling to ladies who are battling against 

 loss of nerve, to hear that I have known brilliant horse- 

 men lose their nerve so utterly that they were unable to 

 take their horses out of a walk. With quiet practice their 

 good nerve returned again, and they have ridden as 

 well as ever. Nerve in riding is recoverable by prac- 

 tice on a very confidential horse. Some men give their 

 wives or daughters horses w^hich are unsuitable for 

 them, and which they are unable to manage. Is it any 

 wonder that such ladies have their nerve entirely shat- 

 tered in their efforts to control half-broken, violent 

 brutes of horses 1 It is customary to blame ladies who 

 are unable to control their horses in the hunting field ; 

 but the men w^ho supply them with such animals are, in 

 many cases, the more deserving of censure. There are 

 men, not many, I hope, who consider it unnecessary for 

 their womenkind to learn to ride before they hunt ; but 

 no one has a right to thus endanger the lives of others. 

 Such ladies possess plenty of pluck, but not the neces- 

 sary knowledge to guide their valour to act in safety. 

 A Master of hounds told me that his nerve was so bad 

 that he positively prayed for frost ! At the end of one 

 season he gave up the hounds ; but he is again hunting 

 them, so his nerve must have become strong. Mr. 

 Scarth Dixon, writing on this subject, says : " It is a 

 curious quality, that of nerve. A man's nerve, by which 

 I mean his riding nerve, will go from him in a day ; it 

 will sometimes, but not frequently, come back to him as 



