“Do you ride the horse after his Grace is thrown,” says he, “and I agree to get on after and he does not kill you.  ’Sdeath!  I am not of the army,” adds my Lord, cuttingly; “I am a seaman, and not supposed to know a stirrup from a snaffle.”

“’Od’s blood!” yelled the captain, “you question my horsemanship, my Lord?  Do I understand your Lordship to question my courage?”

“After I am thrown!” cries his Grace, very ugly, and fingering the jewels on his hilt.

Sir John was awakened by the noise, and turning heavily spilled the whole of a pint of port on the duke’s satin waist coat and breeches.  Whereat Chartersea in a rage flung the bottle at his head with a curse, which it seems was a habit with his Grace.  But the servants coming in, headed by my old friend the chamberlain, they quieted down.  And it was presently agreed that the horse was to be at noon in the King’s Old Road, or Rotten Row (as it was then beginning to be called), in Hyde Park.

I shall carry to the grave the memory of the next day.  I was up betimes, and over to the White Horse Cellar to see Pollux groomed, where I found a crowd about the opening into the stable court.  “The young American!” called some one, and to my astonishment and no small annoyance I was greeted with a “Huzzay for you, sir!” “My groat’s on your honour!”

This good-will was owing wholly to the duke’s unpopularity with all classes.  Inside, sporting gentlemen in hunting-frocks of red and green, and velvet visored caps, were shouldering favoured ’ostlers from the different noblemen’s stables; and there was a liberal sprinkling of the characters who attended the cock mains in Drury Lane and at Newmarket.  At the moment of my arrival the head ’ostler was rubbing down the stallion’s flank.

“Here’s ten pounds to ride him, Saunders!” called one of the hunting-frocks.

“Umph!” sniffed the ’ostler; “ride ’im is it, yere honour?  Two hunner beast eno’, an’ a Portugal crown i’ th’ boot.  Sooner take me chaunces o’ Tyburn on ’Ounslow ‘Eath.  An’ Miller waurna able to sit ’im, ’tis no for th’ likes o’ me to try.  Th’ bloody devil took th’ shirt off Teddy’s back this morn.  I adwises th’ young Buckskin t’ order ’s coffin.”  Just then he perceived me, and touched his cap, something abashed.  “With submission, sir, y’r honour’ll take an old man’s adwise an’ not go near ’im.”

Pollux’s appearance, indeed, was not calculated to reassure me.  He looked ugly to exaggeration, his ears laid back and his nostrils as big as crowns, and his teeth bared time and time.  Now and anon an impatient fling of his hoof would make the grooms start away from him.  Since coming to the inn he had been walked a couple of miles each day, with two men with loaded whips to control him.  I was being offered a deal of counsel, when big Mr. Astley came in from Lambeth, and silenced them all.