I did not wait to watch them; my interest was in those who gallantly led onward, and who now, some four in number, rode almost abreast. Among these, my favorite was the sky-blue jacket who had led the way over the dyke; and him did I follow with straining eyes and palpitating heart. They were at this moment advancing towards a wall,--a high and strong one, and I thought, in the slackened pace and more gathered-up stride, I could read the caution a difficult leap enforced.
A brown jacket with white sleeves was the first to charge it; and after a tremendous scramble, in which the wall, the horse, and the rider were all tumbling together, he got over; but the animal went dead lame, and the rider, dismounting, led him off the ground.
Next came blue-jacket; and just at the very rise his mare balked, and, at the top of her speed, ran away along the side of the wall. A perfect roar of angry disappointment arose from the multitude, for she was the favorite of the country people, who were loudly indignant at this mischance.
"Beatagh"--this was the rider--"pulled her round himself! the mare never was known to refuse a fence!"
"I say you're both wrong!" cried a third, whose excited manner showed he was no indifferent spectator of the scene. "She never will take her first wall fairly; after that she goes like a bird!"
"What a confounded nuisance to think that no one will lead her over the fence! Is there not one here will show her the way?" said he, looking around.
"There's the only fellow I see whose neck can afford it!" said another, pointing to me. "He, evidently, was never born to be killed in a steeplechase."
"Devilish well mounted he is, too!" remarked some one else.
"Hallo, my smart boy!" said he who before alluded to the mare as a bolter, "try your nag over that wall yonder,--go boldly. Let her have her head, and give her a sharp cut as she rises. Make way there, gentlemen! Let the boy have fair play, and I 'll wager a five-pound note he does it! You shall have half the stakes too, if you win!" added he. These were the last words I heard; for the crowd, clearing in front, opened for me to advance, and without a moment's hesitation of any kind, I dashed my heels to the mare's flanks, and galloped forward. A loud shout, and a perfect shower of whips on the mare's quarter from the bystanders, put all question of pulling up beyond the reach of possibility. In a minute more I was at the wall, and, ere I well knew, over it. A few seconds after, the blue-jacket was beside me. "Well done, my lad! You've earned twenty guineas if I win the race! Lead the way a bit, and let your mare choose her ground when she leaps." This was all he said; but such words of encouragement never fell on my ears before.