DISCRETION 



rider of his family, and it is a bold assertion, for 

 when five or six of the brothers are out hunting, 

 there will always be that number of tall heavy 

 men, answering to the name of Bourke in the 

 same field with the hounds. Lord Mayo, or rather 

 Lord Naas (for the best of his sporting career 

 closed with his succession to the earldom), was 

 no less distinguished for his daring horsemanship, 

 than his tact in managing a country, and his skill 

 in hunting a pack of hounds. That he showed 

 less forethouorht in riskins: a valuable life than in 

 conducting the government of an empire, we 

 must attribute to his personal courage and keen 

 delight in the chase, but that he humorously 

 deplored the scarcity of discretion amongst its 

 votaries, the following anecdote, as I had it from 

 himself, sufficiently attests. 



While he hunted his own hounds in Kildare, 

 his most constant attendant, though on foot, was 

 a nondescript character, such as is called "a tight 

 boy" in Ireland, and nov/here else, belonging to 

 a class that never seem to do a day's work, nor 

 to eat a plentiful meal, but are always pleasant, 

 obliging, idle, hungry, thirsty, and supremely 

 happy. Running ten miles on foot to covert, 

 Mick, as he was called, would never leave the 

 hounds till they reached their kennels at night. 

 Thus, plodding home one evening by his lord- 

 ship's horse, after an unusually long and fatiguing 



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