RIDING RECOLLECTIONS 



the interest, and indeed amusement, with which 

 he has watched some mere baby, strangely 

 tackled and uncouthly equipped, sailing along in 

 the front rank, steered with consummate skill and 

 temper by a venerable rider who looks sixty on 

 horseback, and at least eighty on foot. The 

 man's dress is of the shabbiest and most in- 

 congruous, his boots are outrageous, his spurs ill 

 put on, and his hat shows symptoms of ill-usage 

 in warfare or the chase ; but he sits in the saddle 

 like a workman, and age has no more quenched 

 the courage in his bright Irish eye, than it has 

 soured the mirth of his temperament, or saddened 

 the music of his brogue. You know instinctively 

 that he must be a good fellow and a good sports- 

 man ; you cannot follow him for half a mile 

 without being satisfied that he is a good rider, 

 and you forget, in your admiration of his beast's 

 performance, your surprise at its obvious youth, 

 its excessive leanness, and the unusual shabbiness 

 of its accoutrements. Inspecting these more 

 narrowly, if you can get near enough, you begin 

 to grudge the sums you have paid Bartley, or 

 Wilkinson and Kidd, for the neat turn-out you 

 have been taught to consider indispensable to 

 success. You see that a horse may cross a 

 dangerous country speedily and in safety, though 

 its saddle be pulpy and weather - stained, with 

 unequal stirrup - leathers, and only one girth ; 



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