nd
strong in the haunch, they run upon things like greyhounds, all drawn up
behind and low before; it's a downright misery to mount one of them."

"But it's a real pleasure to see him come in first, when your book
tells you seven to one in your favor. Talk of sensations," said he,
enthusiastically; "where is there the equal of that you feel when the
orange and blue you have backed with a heavy pot comes pelting round the
corner, followed by two,--then three,--all punishing, your own fellow
holding on beautifully, with one eye a little thrown backward to see
what's coming, and that quiet, calm look about the mouth that says,
'I have it.' Every note of the wild cheer that greets the winner is
applause to your own heart; that deafening yell is your own song of
triumph."

"Listen to him!--that 's his hobby," cried Kellett, whose eyes glistened
with excitement at the description, and who really felt an honest
admiration for the describer. "Ah, Beecher, my boy!--you 're at home
there."

"If they 'd only give me a chance, Paul,--one chance!"

Whether it was that the expression was new and strange to him, or that
the energy of the speaker astonished him, but Conway certainly turned
his eyes towards him in some surprise; a sentiment which Beecher at once
interpreting as interest, went on,--

"_You_," said he,--"_you_ had many a chance; _I_ never had one. You
might have let them all in, you might have landed them all--so they tell
me, at least--if you'd have withdrawn Eyetooth. He was own brother to
Aurelius, and sure to win. Well, if you 'd have withdrawn him for the
Bexley, you'd have netted fifty thousand. Grog--I mean a fellow 'well
up' among the legs--told me so."

"Your informant never added what every gentleman in England would have
said of me next day," said Conway. "It would have been neither more
nor less than a swindle. The horse was in perfect health and top
condition,--why should I not have run him?"

"For no other reason that I know, except that you 'd have been richer by
fifty thousand for not doing it."

"Well," said Conway, quietly, "it's not a very pleasant thing to be
crippled in this fashion; but I 'd rather lose the other arm than do
what you speak of. And if I did n't know that many gentlemen get a loose
way of talking of fifty things they 'd never seriously think of doing, I
'd rather feel disposed to be offended at what you have just said."

"Offended! of course not,--I never dreamed of anything