66 The Post and the Paddock, 



The Russians, who were once among our largest 

 customers, turn their sires out of the stud at twenty- 

 three, thus virtually following the spirit of the Celtic 

 triplet which says that " Thrice the life of a horse is 

 the hfe of a man," and so on to stags and eagles 

 in geometric progression. Mr. Kirby of York, a 

 very old exporter of horses, did a great business 

 with them for about half a century. This wonder- 

 ful octogenarian first set foot at Cronstadt in 1791, 

 when he was little more than twenty-one, in charge 

 of a string of horses, which a speculative Market 

 Weighton brewer sent out at a venture, and repeated 

 his visits till he was nearly sixty, bearing with him 

 on his dreary three-weeks' voyages the choicest blood 

 of Yorkshire. As his business increased, he gene- 

 rally chartered a vessel there and back again, and on 

 one occasion he took out no less than forty-two in 

 the Mary Frances. They were stabled in the hold 

 on the ballast-sand, and each of them was allowed a 

 stall of six feet by four and a half, while the whole 

 space devoted to them was seven feet high, and well 

 ventilated through the hatches. What with stall fit- 

 tings, corn, hay, straw, water-casks, and freight, they 

 each cost about 10/. on the voyage. He only lost 

 one of them at sea during the whole of his journey- 

 ings ; but as if to make up for it, fourteen were 

 drowned in his sale stables in one night, by a sudden 

 inundation of the Neva. These were not his only 

 perils on Russian soil. He had once scarcely bedded 

 up a lot for the night, after their walk from. Cronstadt 

 to St. Petersburg, and written circulars to his prin- 

 cipal customers, who, like the Emperor Alexander, 

 were wont to convert his stables into a sporting lounge, 

 than he received notice that the Emperor Paul had 

 ordered all the English ships to be seized. The fact 

 of his being a well-known character in Russia saved 

 him from being personally annoyed as his countrymen 

 were ; but still he felt so apprehensive lest his horse? 



