82 SPORTING REMINISCENCES 



signalman came back from his breakfast, peevishly 

 wanting to know why we couldn't hunt on the 

 eleven- thirty like Christians. One day I was on 

 the platform stamping my feet from cold when a 

 friendly engine-driver invited me in to his fire. 



" For I was a sportin' man myself onst/' he 

 said proudly. " Didn't I drive the Hunting 

 Special for a year." 



There is an old farmer at CaherconUsh who 

 cannot see the good of hunting. He talked to us 

 earnestly one day as I waited for the pony to be 

 harnessed. 



" Min of ye're vast wealth," he said captiously, 

 " ridin' mad across the counthry. An' a very 

 ondipendint horse ye'd want too, to bring ye safe." 



We asked him what he would do if some of our 

 vast wealth — he was probably far richer than we 

 were — came his way. 



" Isn't there the chimbly corner if ye had no 

 call to be workin' outside," he said. ** An' pigs — 

 good pigs — an' good dhrink. Not facin' obstacles 

 with ditches I tell ye . . . No . . . But afther 

 all if ye were gone we'd miss the sphots of red," 

 he said as we drove away, a twinkle in his eyes. 



I remember when hunting trembled in the balance 

 someone being stopped near Fedamore and my 

 father happened to be close by. 



He had done something, for the man sent an 

 abject message that evening to say how sorry he 

 was and that, " Faix the Colonel an' his friends 



