A Run 127 



rentl}^ leaving everything to his horse, though, in fact, 

 the community of feeling between them is of the closest ; 

 and when presently there is a suspicion of a peck and a 

 bit of a scramble as the animal lands in a very soft 

 place, he holds it together, quietly sitting still until it 

 has recovered itself, and is again swinging along in its 

 easy stride. 



Contrast him with his friend Eoller. In pluck they 

 are equal. No one ever suggested that Eoller shirked. 

 It is his pride to go straight, and he goes. Just now he 

 had the brook at a very wide and ugly place, a bad take- 

 off and a worse landing, yet he never thought of draw- 

 ing rein. But while Sylvanson's horse glides over the 

 ground and cheerfully takes his fences as they come, 

 Eoller is never quite on good terms with his mount. Its 

 head is generally up as it crosses the flat ; when they 

 approach a fence he is found to be shifting his seat 

 in the saddle and pulling at the horse's mouth ; a few 

 jerks at the bit, a kick with the spurs, and often an 

 unacceptable reminder from his hunting-crop on land- 

 ing, are features of the performance. He is never com- 

 fortable. A bad seat — and bad hands as a necessary 

 and inevitable consequence — is the explanation. 



So easily does Sylvan son make his way that young 

 Clerkson, a youth from town on a visit to some relatives 

 in the Meadowmere country, who has been a little 

 diffident about jumping, determines to have a try. He 

 has had a few lessons in a riding-school, and has dis- 

 ported himself, quite to his own satisfaction, on a sea- 

 side hack ; ])ut the memory of an attempt to surmount a 

 broken-down hurdle, during a day with some harriers, 

 his only previous experience in the field, remains with 

 him. He recollects a terrible shock, as some unexpected 



