THE GREAT HANDICAP RACE. Ill 



that, we had *^a taste/' quite as satisfactory j and then 

 my man, who was a terrible fellow for paying the " ex's/' 

 as he termed them, thoug-ht we might g'o in for a maiden 

 plate. As the boy knew him, and I saw no great 

 objection, they let '^ Snowy " have the mount ; and then 

 — like an ass, no doubt, as I was, — when I saw my wife's 

 eye on the right column in the paper a day or two after, 

 where it detailed that, at Such-and-such Spring Meeting, 

 the City Members' Plate of, &c., &c., for horses that 

 never, &c., &c., was won very cleverly by Mr. Smith's 

 b. c. by Kingston, dam by Emilius, beating half-a-dozen 

 others — then, I say, in the fulness of my heart, I con- 

 fessed that I was Mr. Smith, and that the Kingston colt, 

 the winner of the plate, was the little foal she had feared 

 was too delicate to make a " four-wheeler." 



The Messrs. Weatherby and Co. were not too hard on 

 us ; for, despite another plate and a chicken-hazard handi- 

 cap to the credit side of the account, they let us in for one 

 of the autumn events on very fair terms. At least we 

 thought so, and accepted -, and then other people began 

 to think so too. The list- gentlemen named us in their 

 bill of fare, with *^ prices marked against each article." 

 Next, we came to be quoted at the Corner ; and then, 

 with just the matter- of-form understanding that, if be 

 should, I promised something in the way of new-furnishing 

 a drawing-room that made Bessie's eyes sparkle more, 

 perhaps, than I had ever seen them since that eventful 

 evening when I had asked her, with so much accompany- 

 ing expression, ^' whether I might be always helping her 

 over stiles?" 



Ours wasn't what is called "a fashionable stable/' 

 indeed, my trainer — a thin, wretched-looking man, whose 

 own appearance rather went to confirm the idea— had got 



