VALOUR 



animal for its last half-stride, when, rearing itself 

 almost perpendicularly, it contrived to get safe 

 over, only breaking the top rail with a hind leg. 



This must have lowered the leap by at least a 

 foot, yet when I came to it, thus reduced, and 

 "made easy," it was still a formidable obstacle, 

 and I felt thankful to be on a good jumper. 



Of late years I have seen Mr. Powell, who is 

 usually very well mounted, ride over exceedingly 

 high and forbidding timber so persistently, as to 

 have earned from that material, the noni de chasse 

 by which he is known amongst his friends. 



But perhaps the late Lord Cardigan, the last 

 of the Brudenells, affDrded in the hunting-field, 

 as in all other scenes of life, the most striking 

 example of that "pluck" which is totally inde- 

 pendent of youth, health, strength, or any other 

 physical advantage. The courage that in advanced 

 middle-age governed the steady manoeuvres of 

 Bulganak, and led the death-ride at Balaclava, 

 burned bright and fierce to the end. The 

 graceful seat might be less firm, the tall soldier- 

 like figure less upright, but Mars, one of his last 

 and best hunters, was urged to charge wood and 

 water by the same bold heart at seventy, that 

 tumbled Langar into the Uppingham road over 

 the highest gate in Leicestershire at twenty-six. 

 The foundation of Lord Cardigan's whole character 

 was valour. He loved it, he prized it, he admired 

 I III 



