178 SPORTING STORIES 



the catastrophe to my mother to account for my long silence. 

 I received in reply in due course a long letter detailing 

 family news, without any allusion to my unfortunate case 

 except in a postscript, in which she merely said, ' Oh 

 William, I wish you would give up riding after diviner' ! 

 " Wm. York Moore, Major Gen. 

 '' P.S. — During the fall I stuck to my horse." 



The fall, or leap, or whatever you like to call it, took 

 place, however, before dinner, so that the old lady's suspicions 

 were ill-founded. The details of this extraordinary adven- 

 ture were as follows : Colonel William York Moore, while 

 commanding the troops in Dominica, lost his way one 

 evening after sunset. In complete darkness he endeavoured 

 to make his way home. Two or three times he had con- 

 siderable difficulty in making his horse cross obstacles on 

 the way, but at last they came to something which the 

 horse would not face. Colonel Moore was a fearless rider, 

 and time after time he turned his horse and rode him at 

 full speed against the unknown obstacle, but in vain. At 

 last, urged fiercely by whip and spur, the terrified animal, 

 with a snort of terror, cleared the low hedge — for such it 

 proved to be — in front, and went over the awful precipice. 

 Colonel Moore says that, during his flight on horseback 

 through the air, almost every event of his life flashed across 

 his mind as distinctly and vividly as if they were being 

 actually re-enacted. The faces of all his relatives and 

 friends rose up before him — his whole life seemed mapped 

 out in a luminous panorama before him — when suddenly 

 there came a terrific concussion, which deprived him of his 

 senses and left him with his legs in the sea and his body on 

 the rock, apparently dead. 



He must have lain there stunned for some hours, for when 

 at last the lapping water and cool breeze restored him to 

 his senses the moon was shining brightly in mid-heaven, 

 and its beams fell on the upturned, glittering shoes of his 

 gallant horse, which lay dead and mangled beside him. 



As soon as he had collected his scattered wits. Colonel 

 Moore coolly began to examine himself to ascertain what 

 injuries he had sustained. The result of his investigation 



