22 CLE VERNESS OF IRISH HORSES 



proved what I assert, viz., that men nearly always 

 come to grief through injudicious meddling with their 

 horses' mouths, and from nervousness, ignorance, 

 rushing too fast at their fences, and, worst of all, bad 

 hands. I am convinced that nine falls out of every ten 

 in a flying country are brought about by the supposed, 

 but mistaken help (?) given to trained horses by over- 

 handling them. Strangers who go to a slow-fencing 

 bank country also invariably come to grief from the 

 same cause, viz., nervously meddling with their horses* 

 mouths — than which nothing can be more detrimental 

 to the safe negotiation of banks. Well-bred Irish 

 hunters jump naturally, as was, for example, the case 

 with Mr. Linde's celebrated horse Too Good, who 

 the very first time of asking performed so perfectly 

 over every fence on a course before the Empress of 

 Austria, that her Majesty exclaimed, ' He is too good!' 

 and from that incident he took his name. 



Irish horses are as a rule clever enough, and will 

 seldom put a foot wrong if they are left alone, but 

 if interfered with at every fence, even in a flying 

 country, they forget their training and become 

 demoralized, generally owing to the ignorance of 

 some bruising rider who is constantly coming to grief. 

 Such men are often only showing horses ofl" for sale, 

 and are the greatest nuisances in the hunting-field, and 

 when, as sometimes happens, a master of hounds takes 

 to horse-dealing, good-bye to sport. I regret to say 

 that such cases do occur now and again, and I wonder 

 at times what is cominor to the hunting world, and 

 I long for the return of the days when hounds were 

 the chief attraction, and when fields were limited to 

 some fifty or sixty people, who came out to see them 



