Suppose you try the grey mare you rode t'other day, and
I'll find a quiet one for your friend.
~159~~ Eglan. If I do, I am a _black horse_. She's no paces, nothing
_but a shuffle_, not a _leg to stand on_.
Livery M. Every one as good as the principal of All-Souls. Not a better
bred thing in Oxford, and all horses here gallop by instinct, as every
body knows, but they can't go for ever, and when gentlemen ride steeple
chases of sixty miles or more right a-head, they ought to find their own
horse-flesh.
Eglan. What coming _crabb_ over us, old fellow, hey 1 Very well, I shall
bolt and try Randall, and that's all about it. Come along, Blackmantle.
My friend's threat of withdrawing his patronage had immediately the
desired effect. Horace's judgment in horse-flesh was universally
admitted, and the knowing dealer, although he had suffered in one
instance by hard riding, yet deeply calculated on retrieving his loss by
some unsuspecting Freshman, or other university Nimrod in the circle
of Eglantine's acquaintance. By this time Echo had arrived, and we were
soon mounted on the two fresh purchases which the honest Yorkshireman
had so disinterestedly pointed out; and which, to do him justice,
deserved the eulogium he had given us on their merits. One circumstance
must not however be forgotten, which was the following notice posted
at the end of the yard.
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