ON STEEPLE-CHASING. 299 



events are of no general interest, but the 

 course is ; and it should prove to the most 

 pig-headed advocate of regulation fences, 

 that every country is the best judge of 

 its own. On this Totnes course they pass 

 under a railway arch, with a narrow mar- 

 gin of pathway between them and the 

 river, over which they have also to make 

 their way before getting into the country ; 

 and they go up what appears to be an 

 exceeding high mountain, with banks and 

 other formidable fences. You see them 

 afar, against the horizon, on the brow of 

 the hill, and then the descent commences, 

 with a jump or two downhill also, one 

 of them being a bank. At the foot of the 

 hill they land into the hard road, gallop 

 along it nearly tAvo hundred yards, then turn 

 sharp into the river Dart once more, a man 

 with a red flag on the road waving it in 

 the horses' faces to prevent their shirking 

 the turn. Through the river they plunge — 



