HIS NERVE IX A DIFFICULTY. 153 



iiave ridden as he rode them. Mr. Lindow's Clipper was, for 

 example, so hard a puller with hounds that the bit, called 

 ' the Clipper bit,' \vas made purposely to suit him ; and a 

 most severe one it is. On a proposal being one day made, 

 that Lindow and Smith should exchange horses for the 

 day, the latter, previously to mounting the Clipper, put his 

 curb-chain into his pocket. ' Good-bye to you ! ' said his 

 friend, as the hounds were finding their fox, 'we shall never 

 see you again.' He rode, however, in his usual place, — 

 alongside the pack." * 



" I once saw," relates a friend, " a fine specimen of Mr. 

 Smith's hand and nerve in going off of a frost, when the 

 hone was not quite out of the ground. "We were running 

 a fox hard over Salisbury Plain, when all at once his horse 

 came on a treacherous flat, greasy at top, as sportsmen say, 

 but hard and slippery underneath. The horse he rode was 

 a hard puller, and very violent, named Piccadilly ; and the 

 least check from the bridle, when the animal began to 

 blunder, would have to a certainty made him slip up. 

 Here the fine riding of the squire shone conspicuously. 

 He left his horse entirely alone, as if he were swimming ; 

 and after floundering about and swerving for at least a 

 hundred yards, Piccadilly recovered himself and went on as 

 if nothing had happened. I saw him," he adds, " on the 

 same horse on another occasioCj when a fox was sinking, 

 and his horse so beaten that he could scarcely ride at a 

 fence, charge a stiff" wattled hedge. The horse got over, 

 but came down on his head, nevertheless was quickly 

 righted again. The same fence, with a ditcli from him, was 

 to be encountered again at going out of the field ; and here 

 the squire's address was no less remarkable than had been 

 his cool courage. Whon within about twent}^ yards of the 

 fence he had a pull at his horse, and after a slight pause 



* ''Hunting Reminiscences.*'" 



