ting his horse
well by the head, rams in the spurs, and flourishes his cutting whip high
in air, with a 'g--u--u--ur along! do you think I'--the 'stole you' being
lost under water just as Sponge clears the brook a little lower down.
Spareneck then pulls up.

When Nimrod had Dick Christian under water in the Whissendine in his
Leicestershire run, and someone more humane than the rest of the field
observed, as they rode on,

'But he'll be drowned.'

'Shouldn't wonder,' exclaimed another.

'But the pace,' Nimrod added, 'was too good to inquire.'

Such, however, was not the case with our watering-place cock, Mr. Sponge.
Independently of the absurdity of a man risking his neck for the sake of
picking up a bunch of red herrings, Mr. Sponge, having beat everybody,
could afford a little humanity, more especially as he rode his horse on
sale, and there was now no one left to witness the further prowess of the
steed. Accordingly, he availed himself of a heavy, newly-ploughed fallow,
upon which he landed as he cleared the brook, for pulling up, and returned
just as Mr. Spareneck, assisted by one of the whips, succeeded in landing
Caingey on the taking-off side. Caingey was not a pretty boy at the best of
times--none but the most partial parents could think him one--and his
clumsy-featured, short, compressed face, and thick, lumpy figure, were
anything but improved by a sort of pea-green net-work of water-weeds with
which he arose from his bath. He was uncommonly well soaked, and had to be
held up by the heels to let the water run out of his boots, pockets, and
clothes. In this undignified position he was found by Mr. Waffles and such
of the field as had ridden the line.

'Why, Caingey, old boy! you look like a boiled porpoise with parsley
sauce!' exclaimed Mr. Waffles, pulling up where the unfortunate youth was
spluttering and getting emptied like a jug. 'Confound it!' added he, as
the water came gurgling out of his mouth, 'but you must have drunk the
brook dry.'

Caingey would have censured his inhumanity, but knowing the imprudence of
quarrelling with his bread and butter, and also aware of the laughable,
drowned-rat figure he must then be cutting, he thought it best to laugh,
and take his change out of Mr. Waffles another time. Accordingly, he
chuckled and laughed too, though his jaws nearly refused their office, and
kindly transferred the blame of the accident from the horse to himself.

[Illustration: MR. CAINGEY THO