chasers, and hunters, I would recommend Tattersall's; for hacks
or machiners, there's Aldridge's, in St. Martin's Lane; while Dixon's,
in the Barbican, is the place to pick up a fine young carthorse--is it a
young cart-horse you want?"

"My dear fellow, don't worry me," returned I, feeling very cross,
and trying to look amiable; "you know what I mean; is there anything
rideable to be hired in Hilling-ford? I have a call to make which is
beyond a walk."

"Let me see," replied Freddy, musing; "you wouldn't like a very little
pony, with only one eye and a rat-tail, I suppose--it might look absurd
with your long legs, I'm afraid--or else Mrs. Meek, the undertaker's
widow, has got a very quiet one that poor Meek used to ride--a child
could manage it:--there's the butcher's fat mare, but she won't stir a
step without the basket on her back, and it would be so troublesome
for you to carry that all the way. Tomkins, the sweep, has got a little
horse he'd let you have, I daresay, but it always comes off black on
one's trousers: and the miller's cob is just as bad the other way with
the flour. I know a donkey--"

"So do I," was the answer, as, laughing in spite of myself, I turned to
leave the room.

"Here, stop a minute!" cried Freddy, following me, "you are so
dreadfully impetuous; there's nothing morally wrong in being acquainted
with a donkey, is there? 1 assure you I did not mean anything personal;
and now for a word of sense. Bumpus, at the Green Man, has got a
tremendous horse, which nearly frightened me into fits the only time I
ever mounted him, so that it will just suit you; nobody but a _green_
man, or a knight-errant, which I consider much the same sort of thing,
would patronise such an animal--still, he's the only one I know of."

Coleman's tremendous horse, which proved to be a tall, pig-headed,
hard-mouthed brute, with a very decided will of his own, condescended,
after sundry skirmishes and one pitched battle, occasioned by his
positive refusal to pass a windmill, to go the road I wished, and about
an hour's ride brought me to the gate of Barstone Park. So completely
had I been hurried on by feeling in every stage of the affair, and so
entirely had all minor considerations given way to the paramount object
of ~294~~ securing Clara's happiness, with which, as I now felt, my
own was indissolubly linked, that it was not until my eye rested on
the cold, grey stone of Barstone Priory, and wandered over the straigh