5 TEEPLE- ChA sing 2/9 



it when he recalls it to memory after having passed the 

 claret, not for the first time. It was not so high by 

 nearly two feet as he now supposes ; and his estimate 

 of the ditch is excessive ; he forgets, too, that he by no 

 means liked the look of it when he saw what was before 

 him, and that he was unaffectedly glad when he had 

 landed, not sitting down in his saddle quite as he would 

 like, but on his horse's neck with a lost stirrup iron, 

 on the other side. He only remembers that he did 

 get over in safety, and he does not think — when the 

 decanters are round again, and he hears his neighbour 

 hinting that lie did get great things in jumping out of a 

 certain lane, a jump that a boy might have cleared on a 

 Shetland pony — that anybody in the Hunt could have 

 followed him. It may have been the horse, it may have 

 been — perhaps, he thinks, it was — the rider ; but he is 

 fully satisfied that the pair are invincible, so satisfied 

 that he is ready to back his opinion and make a match 

 on the spot. 



By some such reflections as these it was that steeple- 

 chases were originated in former times. Matches grew 

 up in the course of discussion about the events of the 

 day's sport after hounds — and probably the older genera- 

 tion of sportsmen were more careful to ride after 

 hounds instead of over them ? Sometimes, indeed, the 

 men could not wait till morning to decide the question, 

 for more than one case is on record where a party of 

 sportsmen have risen from the table and started off on a 

 steeple-chase forthwith, putting white shirts over their 

 coats, so that competitors might be visible, and a man 

 who was down might not be jumped on unnecessarily in 

 the shadow. The deciding of such races must have had 

 a serious tendency to perplex the judge. 



