Then I knew that he had won a
richer prize than ever was set on a race since the first Great
Metropolitan was run for at Olympia.
Livingstone had washed away the traces of his fall (his wound was only a
cut under the hair, above the temple), and was going to get the horses
in line to start them for the farmers' cup. As he passed Miss Bellasys
he checked his horse for an instant, and said, very coldly,
"You are satisfied, I trust?"
"All's well that ends well," answered Flora; "but I began to tremble for
my bets. I thought you were waiting too long."
Guy did not wish to pursue the subject apparently, for he rode on
without reply. Flora made no attempt to detain him. She had studied the
signs of the times in his countenance long enough to be weather-wise,
and to know that the better part of valor was advisable when the
quicksilver had sunk to Stormy.
The cup was a great success. Eleven started, and three made a most
artistic finish--scarcely a length between first and third. The farmers
of the present day ride very differently from their ancestors of fifty
years ago, whose highest ambition was to pound along after the slow,
sure "currant-jelly dogs."
Go down into the Vale of Belvoir; watch one of the duke's tenants
handing a five-year old over the Smite, and say if the modern
agriculturists might not boast with Tydides,
_"hemeis de pateron meg' ameinones euchometh' einai.
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