RIDING RECOLLECTIONS 



than would most Englishmen, and with a lighter 

 hand on his horse's mouth, though his legs and 

 knees are keeping the pupil well into its bridle, 

 and, should the latter want to refuse, or "renage," 

 as they say in Ireland, a disgrace of which it has 

 not the remotest idea, there is a slip of ground- 

 ash in the man's fingers ready to administer "a 

 refresher" on its flank. "Did ye draw now?" 

 asks an Irishman when his friend is describing 

 how he accomplished some extraordinary feat in 

 leaping, and the expression, derived from an 

 obsolete custom of sticking the cutting -whip 

 upright in the boot, so that it has come to mean 

 punishment from that instrument, is nearly always 

 answered — " I did 7iot \ " Light as a fairy, our 

 young but experienced hunter dances down to 

 the gulf, and leaves it behind with scarce an effort, 

 while an unwashed hand bestows its caress on 

 the reeking neck that will hereafter thicken 

 prodigiously in some Saxon stable on a proper 

 allowance of corn. If you are riding an Irish 

 horse, you cannot do better than imitate closely 

 every motion of the pair in front. If not, you 

 will be wise, I think, to turn round and go home. 

 Presently we will hope, for the sake of the 

 neophyte, whose condition is by no means on a 

 par with his natural powers, the hounds either 

 kill their fox, or run him to ground, or lose, or 

 otherwise account for him, thus affording a few 



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