her classes of the English has
had a great and salutary effect upon national character. I do not know a
finer race of men than the English gentlemen. Instead of the softness
and effeminacy which characterizes the men of rank of most countries,
they exhibit a union of elegance and strength, of robustness of frame
and freshness of complexion, which I am inclined to attribute to their
living so much in the open air, pursuing so eagerly the invigorating
recreations of the country."

FOOTNOTES:

[213-*] I think this is a mistake. In a copy of the rules forwarded to
me by a Cheshire squire, one of the hereditary members of the club, it
is a pair of _gloves_. But in the notes, the songs and ballads by R.
Egerton Warburton, Esq., of Arley Hall, it is printed "breeches."

CHAPTER XIV.

THE WILD PONIES OF EXMOOR.

In England there are so few wild horses, that the following description
of a visit I made to Exmoor a few years ago in the month of September,
may be doubly interesting, since Mr. Rarey has shown a short and easy
method of dealing with the principal produce of that truly wild region.

The road from South Molton to Exmoor is a gradual ascent over a
succession of hills, of which each descent, however steep, leads to a
still longer ascent, until you reach the high level of Exmoor. The first
six miles are through real Devonshire lanes; on each side high banks,
all covered with fern and grass, and topped with shrubs and trees; for
miles we were hedged in with hazels, bearing nuts with a luxuriance
wonderful to the eyes of those accustomed to see them sold at the
corners of streets for a penny the dozen. In spring and summer, wild
flowers give all the charms of colour to these game-preserving
hedgerows; but a rainy autumn had left no colour among the rich green
foliage, except here and there a pyramid of the bright red berries of
the mountain ash.

So, up hill and down dale, over water-courses--now merrily trotting,
anon descending, and not less merrily trudging up, steep ascents--we
proceed by a track as sound as if it had been under the care of a model
board of trustees--for the simple reason that it rested on natural rock.
We pushed along at an average rate of some six miles an hour, allowing
for the slow crawling up hills; passing many rich fields wherein fat
oxen of the Devon breed calmly grazed, with sheep that had certainly not
been bred on mountains. Once we passed a deserted copper-mine; which,
aft