Away went Sturgeon, like a shot,-- Away, away! The mare could trot; And so she did,--nor did she pause.-- John Tattsall gained the world's applause; For one sharp bite upon the side, And such a gripe of hair and hide, The monster held within his claw, That Sturgeon scarce could hold her jaw. With head uplift, and leg up high, The mare, like swallow, seemed to fly, And soon, from Sturgeon's round bald pate, The wig and hat flew o'er the gate; But on rode Sturgeon, made to know How well to make a mare to go. CHAPTER X. _The Tumbler, or its Affinities._ We cannot narrate all the varieties of patients the Doctor had to deal with. We leave the ladies' cases out of the question, though he strongly recommended to them his great receipt--a ride on horseback. Of all the difficult cases the Doctor had to deal with, was that of a little stingy, dyspeptic, middle aged pin-man, retired from business, and resident in Pimlico. He was never satisfied. No one could convince him that he was not a good rider, though he had caused more broken-kneed horses in one month, than any other rider had made in twelve months. He literally went by the name of Tumble-down-Pincushion. It was no use furnishing him with a good horse; down it would come before long, and the little man would roll over like a pincushion; pick himself up, and declare it was the fault of the horse. [Illustration] He would exasperate his Doctor, and his Doctor's friend, by pretending to show them how a man ought to sit on horseback; and truly, if ever there was a contrast visible, it was in the upright figure of John Tattsall on horseback, and Mr. Jeremiah Hinchman, the retired pin-man of Pimlico. John always knew how to make the most of a horse. Mr. Hinchman never did make any thing but the least of himself and of his horse also. There was a strange affinity between his horse and himself,--at least, between him and one, a favourite rat-tailed sorrel gray. If it tumbled down, it was never disturbed: it was so accustomed to the affinity with the ground, that its knees became hardened with a species of horney excrescence, that seldom showed any thing but dirt, if it did tumble. Nor did the little man either, for having a remarkably light weight in the saddle, and a prominent disposition to bend over his horse's neck, he generally cast a very light summersault in his exit from the seat to the ground. "I wish," he said one day to Mr. Tattsall, in no very amiable mood, "I wish you would put me in some way of not falling off the tumble-down-horses which you sent me."