The Honourable smiled feebly, but vouchsafed no reply. It was indeed too true, and as he had rather set his heart on winning this steeple-chase, the truth was unacceptable, as usual. Mr. Sawyer seemed to ponder deeply on what he had heard. “I should lose so much hunting,” said he, after a pause, during which he had smoked with considerable perseverance and an aspect of profound reflection. “Why, a horse would not have the ghost of a chance, would he, unless he was put to training?” Doctors differ upon most subjects. “No training like regular hunting,” said Struggles, who meant to have nothing to do with it. “Take him out often, and send him home early,” advised Major Brush, who was generally of opinion that nothing more would be done after 1 P.M. “The half-bred ones seldom stand regular preparation,” opined Mr. Savage, “I should keep him here under my own eye;” while the Honourable Crasher murmured something about “Newmarket being the only place to get a donkey fit.” Mr. Sawyer turned from one to the other, as if weighing carefully what each had said; then he flung his cigar-end into the grate, finished his liquor at a gulp, and observing, “Well, I must think about it; in the meantime I’m going to hunt him to-morrow,” wished his friends “Good-night,” and departed for what he was pleased to term his “downy.” As Struggles and Brush, who occupied adjoining bedrooms, shouldered each other up the narrow passage that led to their apartments, the former declared with a stupendous yawn, “He didn’t quite know what to make of their new friend, but fancied, whether the bay was a _dark_ one or not, his owner was well able to take care of himself.” To which the Major, whose eyes seemed much dazzled by the candle in his hand, of which he was spilling the wax with considerable liberality over the passage-carpet, replied, “We shall find out all about him to-morrow, old boy, if we keep our eyes open—that’s all: if we only keep our eyes open!” And for the better furtherance of this wide-awake scheme, the Major, whose eyes were already nearly closed, proceeded to turn in, after an attempt to undress, in which he only partially succeeded. Mr. Sawyer, winding up his watch and depositing it carefully on his toilet-table, observed a face of considerable wisdom in his looking-glass, as he reflected on the interest which seemed to have been created about Marathon. He balanced the pros and cons: he enumerated, not without disgust, the numerous failings of the horse; then he shook his head twice or thrice, gravely, as was his habit, when, to use his own expression, “he thought he saw his way.” ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER XIV “BEFORE THE DAWN”