no The Coitrse, the Camp, the Chase 



a triumphant one. The ferry-boat had been repaired, and 

 was ready to receive us, but all the population of the 

 village turned out to do honour to the pony that had 

 swam across in the morning. 



The history of that pony was rather remarkable, for 

 one of our subalterns — the present Sir Thomas Fermor- 

 Hesketh — put into a raffle for him, and tied with another 

 man for first prize. The day and hour were fixed for 

 the " tie " to be decided by the throw of dice, but, 

 unfortunately, it was Hesketh's turn to go on guard, and 

 he was consequently unable to be present. He there- 

 fore requested me to go in his stead, and at the appointed 

 time I presented myself at the rendezvous, the back 

 parlour of Jackman, the horsedealer's house, which was 

 crowded with spectators. We were to have three throws 

 of three dice each time out of a teacup ! We threw in 

 turns, and I made an extremely good score, getting 18, 

 17, and 13. My opponent was beaten easily, but then 

 objected to the decision on the ground that he had never 

 thrown dice out of a teacup before ! I promptly responded 

 by announcing that not only had I never thrown out of a 

 teacup, but, in addition, I had never thrown three dice before ! 

 The objection was therefore overruled, and the pony came 

 into the possession of Mr. Hesketh. He was an Exmoor, 

 nearly white in colour, between 12 and 13 hands high, 

 and one of the fastest and gamest ponies in the world; 

 and before being raffled for had been matched to trot 

 sixteen miles in the hour in an ordinary pony-trap. 



Plymouth was a charming quarter, and with hunting 

 and shooting in the winter, and cricket, steeplechasing, 

 fishing, and otter-hunting in the summer, there was always 

 some exciting amusement on hand. A piece of luck befell 



