TIPPEKARY IX OCTOBER 385 



horse will carry you along in spite of yourself. In the 

 latter a cunning man may squeeze a half-taught, free- 

 jumping horse from field to field, while the other may find 

 L^rief unutterable in half a mile. Am I right ? 



In either country a fairly safe plan is to look for a 

 guiding star. In Tipperary take the Master and Mr. W. 

 Rial!, now twin planets, by reason of the field master 

 having donned suitable attire, the cap and gown of office. 

 There is almost monotony in the fact that, whenever 

 hounds are going their fastest over a strong country, right 

 and left and foremost ride Master and field-master, with 

 room enough for the pack between them. And during this 

 present scurry the Master was taking his w^eekly ride upon 

 Newtown. During the present twelve-minute steeplechase 

 perhaps their nearest attendants, as far as I was in a position 

 to see, were Mr. W. Perry and Lord Tyrone. 



To ground at Oatrath, if thus I caught rightly the 

 name and guessed the spelling. A terrier did the need- 

 ful ; and horses had scarce caught their wind ere we were 

 running back to Donegal. The pack flashed over the 

 line at starting — all but a single hound of Lord Doneraile's 

 blood, who ran alone for several fields. (Lord Done- 

 raile's, as you may know^, is tantamount to Lord Henry 

 Bentinck's.) In another quarter hour our fox was re- 

 entering Donegal — hounds a single field behind him. 

 The pack was then stopped, sport being held preferable 

 to blood in Tipperary. Donegal, moreover, has taken tw'o 

 years to recover the accidental killing of a vixen in covert. 

 It calls for still greater audacity on my part to express 

 an opinion on the rosy facing that the Tipperary ladies 

 have added to their habits. To my humble and incom- 

 petent eye the new departure appears a very pronounced 

 success. Riding habits, fair ladies, always seem to me to 

 require lighting up. The open waistcoat has done some- 

 thing of this, the open scarf still more. But in a sombre 

 closed habit you none of you look your best ; most of 

 you look exactly alike, and only a face that possesses 

 exceptional colouring of its own at all does itself credit. 

 Of course it is excessive impertinence on my part to say 

 as much. But this is what men think, and it remains for 

 the scribe to take the onus of expressing it. 



2 B 



