/The effects of great activity and presence of mind--A favourite
hound described, which pups while pursuing a hare; the hare also
litters while pursued by the hound--Presented with a famous horse
by Count Przobossky, with which he performs many extraordinary
feats./
All these narrow and lucky escapes, gentlemen, were chances turned to
advantage by presence of mind and vigorous exertions, which, taken
together, as everybody knows, make the fortunate sportsman, sailor,
and soldier; but he would be a very blamable and imprudent sportsman,
admiral, or general, who would always depend upon chance and his
stars, without troubling himself about those arts which are their
particular pursuits, and without providing the very best implements,
which insure success. I was not blamable either way; for I have always
been as remarkable for the excellency of my horses, dogs, guns, and
swords, as for the proper manner of using and managing them, so that
upon the whole I may hope to be remembered in the forest, upon the
turf, and in the field. I shall not enter here into any detail of my
stables, kennel, or armoury; but a favourite bitch of mine I cannot
help mentioning to you; she was a greyhound, and I never had or saw a
better. She grew old in my service, and was not remarkable for her
size, but rather for her uncommon swiftness. I always coursed with
her. Had you seen her you must have admired her, and would not have
wondered at my predilection, and at my coursing her so much. She ran
so fast, so much, and so long in my service, that she actually ran off
her legs; so that, in the latter part of her life, I was under the
necessity of working and using her only as a terrier, in which quality
she still served me many years.
Coursing one day a hare, which appeared to me uncommonly big, I pitied
my poor bitch, being big with pups, yet she would course as fast as
ever. I could follow her on horseback only at a great distance. At
once I heard a cry as it were of a pack of hounds--but so weak and
faint that I hardly knew what to make of it. Coming up to them, I was
greatly surprised. The hare had littered in running; the same had
happened to my bitch in coursing, and there were just as many leverets
as pups. By instinct the former ran, the latter coursed: and thus I
found myself in possession at once of six hares, and as many dogs, at
the end of a course which had only begun with one.
I remember this, my wonderful bitch, with the same pleasure and
tenderness as a superb Lithuanian horse, which no money could have
bought. He became mine by an accident, which gave me an opportunity of
showing my horsemanship to a great advantage. I was at Count
Przobossky's noble country-seat in Lithuania, and remained with the
ladies at tea in the drawing-room, while the gentlemen were down in
the yard, to see a young horse of blood which had just arrived from
the stud. We suddenly heard a noise of distress; I hastened down-
stairs, and found the horse so unruly, that nobody durst approach or
mount him. The most resolute horsemen stood dismayed and aghast;
despondency was expressed in every countenance, when, in one leap, I
was on his back, took him by surprise, and worked him quite into
gentleness and obedience with the best display of horsemanship I was
master of. Fully to show this to the ladies, and save them unnecessary
trouble, I forced him to leap in at one of the open windows of the
tea-room, walked round several times, pace, trot, and gallop, and at
last made him mount the tea-table, there to repeat his lessons in a
pretty style of miniature which was exceedingly pleasing to the
ladies, for he performed them amazingly well, and did not break either
cup or saucer. It placed me so high in their opinion, and so well in
that of the noble lord, that, with his usual politeness, he begged I
would accept of this young horse, and ride him full career to conquest
and honour in the campaign against the Turks, which was soon to be
opened, under the command of Count Munich.
I could not indeed have received a more agreeable present, nor a more
ominous one at the opening of that campaign, in which I made my
apprenticeship as a soldier. A horse so gentle, so spirited, and so
fierce--at once a lamb and a Bucephalus, put me always in mind of the
soldier's and the gentleman's duty! of young Alexander, and of the
astonishing things he performed in the field.
We took the field, among several other reasons, it seems, with an
intention to retrieve the character of the Russian arms, which had
been blemished a little by Czar Peter's last campaign on the Pruth;
and this we fully accomplished by several very fatiguing and glorious
campaigns under the command of that great general I mentioned before.
Modesty forbids individuals to arrogate to themselves great successes
or victories, the glory of which is generally engrossed by the
commander--nay, which is rather awkward, by kings and queens who never
smelt gunpowder but at the field-days and reviews of their troops;
never saw a field of battle, or an enemy in battle array.
Nor do I claim any particular share of glory in the great engagements
with the enemy. We all did our duty, which, in the patriot's,
soldier's, and gentleman's language, is a very comprehensive word, of
great honour, meaning, and import, and of which the generality of idle
quidnuncs and coffee-house politicians can hardly form any but a very
mean and contemptible idea. However, having had the command of a body
of hussars, I went upon several expeditions, with discretionary
powers; and the success I then met with is, I think, fairly and only
to be placed to my account, and to that of the brave fellows whom I
led on to conquest and to victory. We had very hot work once in the
van of the army, when we drove the Turks into Oczakow. My spirited
Lithuanian had almost brought me into a scrape: I had an advanced
fore-post, and saw the enemy coming against me in a cloud of dust,
which left me rather uncertain about their actual numbers and real
intentions: to wrap myself up in a similar cloud was common prudence,
but would not have much advanced my knowledge, or answered the end for
which I had been sent out; therefore I let my flankers on both wings
spread to the right and left and make what dust they could, and I
myself led on straight upon the enemy, to have nearer sight of them:
in this I was gratified, for they stood and fought, till, for fear of
my flankers, they began to move off rather disorderly. This was the
moment to fall upon them with spirit; we broke them entirely--made a
terrible havoc amongst them, and drove them not only back to a walled
town in their rear, but even through it, contrary to our most sanguine
expectation.
The swiftness of my Lithuanian enabled me to be foremost in the
pursuit; and seeing the enemy fairly flying through the opposite gate,
I thought it would be prudent to stop in the market-place, to order
the men to rendezvous. I stopped, gentlemen; but judge of my
astonishment when in this market-place I saw not one of my hussars
about me! Are they scouring the other streets? or what is become of
them? They could not be far off, and must, at all events, soon join
me. In that expectation I walked my panting Lithuanian to a spring in
this market-place, and let him drink. He drank uncommonly, with an
eagerness not to be satisfied, but natural enough; for when I looked
round for my men, what should I see, gentlemen! the hind part of the
poor creature--croup and legs were missing, as if he had been cut in
two, and the water ran out as it came in, without refreshing or doing
him any good! How it could have happened was quite a mystery to me,
till I returned with him to the town-gate. There I saw, that when I
rushed in pell-mell with the flying enemy, they had dropped the
portcullis (a heavy falling door, with sharp spikes at the bottom, let
down suddenly to prevent the entrance of an enemy into a fortified
town) unperceived by me, which had totally cut off his hind part, that
still lay quivering on the outside of the gate. It would have been an
irreparable loss, had not our farrier contrived to bring both parts
together while hot. He sewed them up with sprigs and young shoots of
laurels that were at hand; the wound healed, and, what could not have
happened but to so glorious a horse, the sprigs took root in his body,
grew up, and formed a bower over me; so that afterwards I could go
upon many other expeditions in the shade of my own and my horse's
laurels.
