196 THE BEST OP^ THE FUN 



I will give you another point that tells in favour of the 

 Irishman and his young horse, and that will in some 

 measure explain how he makes horse-breeding pay when 

 you can't ; for doubtless, with all the friendly assistance 

 of the Royal Grant, you are endeavouring with all your 

 might to breed 300-guinea hunters upon a fee of two 

 guineas (is it not thus that the advocates of horse-raising 

 put the matter before you ? Alas and alack ! I fear you 

 will never attain it). Well, with their mild winters and their 

 ever-growing grass — I don't forget the limestone soil, but 

 we have that in many parts of England too — the Irish 

 colts thrive and grow all winter, and they and their dams 

 cost very little to keep. In fact they grow into money; 

 very many of ours grow into weeds, and often actually cost 

 the farmer additional money only to get rid of them. 



The Duhallow 



My destination on this occasion was Cork, and my 

 opportunity the Duhallow and the United, neither of 

 which packs I had yet seen. Dispensing with preliminaries, 

 suffice it that on. Friday, January 20, 1893, I was fortunate 

 enough to find myself one of a party of twenty-three, in a 

 special from Cork, bound for Buttevant. It goes without 

 saying that there were also exactly twenty-three horses in 

 the train ; for no one apparently ever dreams of taking out 

 more than one horse per diem in Ireland. In that 

 country — a paradise of sport, a purgatory of politics— a 

 horse can do a whole day's work. In England, with pro- 

 bably a year or two of improved condition in him, he can 

 do half a good day, and only the whole of a very indifferent 

 day. But then, the light soil that allows the old mare and 

 the donkey to plough it with ease is not only generally left 

 to grow grass, but in neither condition does it hold and 

 cling like our rich soils that are so rapidly breaking our 

 farmers. And, again, there is not half the effort required, 

 or the jar incurred, in going on and off a bank as in flying 

 a wide hedge-and-ditch ; albeit the banks of county Cork 

 are almost universally stone-faced, demanding a clean up- 

 jump, with no foothold till the top is reached. 



The Duhallow country, at present hunted by Mr. 



i 



