March Winds 



is no keener observer of nature than the agri- 

 cultural labourer if you can only get him to talk. 



March is a month, too, when the careful man 

 will look critically through his stud with a view 

 to supplying deficiencies, for now is the best time 

 to buy. A horse that has been regularly hunted 

 has got all the superfluous fat off him by this 

 time, and you will be able to see him as he is. 

 He is also better to buy at the end than at the 

 beginning of the season, and there is the addi- 

 tional advantage — and it is no small one — of 

 having the summer for your new purchase and 

 you to get used to each other. Even the best 

 of men ride a horse that they know and like with 

 more confidence than they do a strange one. 

 And buy a horse of a farmer if there is any 

 farmer who has one like suiting you. The long 

 draws, which are so frequent in March, will give 

 you plenty of opportunity of looking a horse 

 over; they will give you a good chance of a 

 thorough trial, and half an hour's trial with 

 hounds is worth more than half a day's trial in 

 a dealer's yard and trial ground. 



If you buy of a farmer you will be well thought 

 153 



