The Foreign Market, 153 



no price on him. Eventually he departed with a 

 perfect Noah's Ark full of specimens for the pupils. 

 There was nothing — 



*' To pencil dear, or pen," 



which was not, after that, to be found on their farm. 

 Assault and Cataract represented the blood stock, and 

 two Clevelands, a grey Norfolk trotter, two Suffolk 

 Punches, and a hunting mare of Lord Elcho's, over 

 whom any anatomical professor might have lectured, 

 were the chief residents. Added to these, were spe- 

 cimens from the styes of Lord Radnor, Mr. Pusey, 

 and Fisher Hobbs ; Wiseton furnished its shorthorn 

 descendants of old Gold, and game fowl and Dorkings 

 were not forgotten. 



The Derby is quite the Frenchman's a French 

 race, and with a little more Epsom prac- steeplechase. 

 tice, they would become quite as expert Knights of 

 the Foray as those who annually issue from the Grand 

 Stand, and proceed to " draw the hill," about hamper 

 time. Steeplechasing is also their great delight, and 

 it was the one which Captain Peel won on Proceed at 

 Worcester that first stimulated Mons. de Thannberg 

 to establish them at the Haras du Pen, three hundred 

 miles from Paris. The peasants had plenty of brood 

 mares in that province, and it was thought that they 

 would overcome their objection to using our blemished 

 stallions, when they had once seen them jump. A 

 handicap claiming race was accordingly set on foot, 

 and ten or twelve English horses were entered. In 

 their zeal to get a high test, the stififest of posts and 

 rails were screwed and morticed together, so that 

 nothing short of steam-power could break them ; 

 fences were built up with osiers fourteen feet high ; 

 a ditch was dammed back till it swelled into a Serbo- 

 nian bog ; and Multum in Parvo, a fifteen-one, Lin- 

 colnshire hunter, and Saucy Boy, by Sir Arthur, with 

 heavily repaired hocks, were the only two that got 



