Mr. Sponges Sporting Tour | Page 5

you can get an answer
from them at all, it is generally delivered in such a way as to show that
the answerer thinks you are what they call 'chaffing them,' asking them
what you know.
These farms serve the double purpose of purveyors to the London
stables, and hospitals for sick, overworked, or unsaleable horses. All
the great job-masters and horse-dealers have these retreats in the
country, and the smaller ones pretend to have, from whence, in due
course, they can draw any sort of an animal a customer may want, just
as little cellarless wine-merchants can get you any sort of wine from
real establishments--if you only give them time.
There was a good deal of mystery about Scampley. It was sometimes in
the hands of Mr. Benjamin Buckram, sometimes in the hands of his
assignees, sometimes in those of his cousin, Abraham Brown, and
sometimes John Doe and Richard Roe were the occupants of it.
Mr. Benjamin Buckram, though very far from being one, had the
advantage of looking like a respectable man. There was a certain plump,

well-fed rosiness about him, which, aided by a bright-coloured dress,
joined to a continual fumble in the pockets of his drab trousers, gave
him the air of a 'well-to-do-in-the-world' sort of man. Moreover, he
sported a velvet collar to his blue coat, a more imposing ornament than
it appears at first sight. To be sure, there are two sorts of velvet
collars--the legitimate velvet collar, commencing with the coat, and the
adopted velvet collar, put on when the cloth one gets shabby.
Buckram's was always the legitimate velvet collar, new from the first,
and, we really believe, a permanent velvet collar, adhered to in storm
and in sunshine, has a very money-making impression on the world. It
shows a spirit superior to feelings of paltry economy, and we think a
person would be much more excusable for being victimized by a man
with a good velvet collar to his coat, than by one exhibiting that
spurious sign of gentility--a horse and gig.
The reader will now have the kindness to consider Mr. Sponge arriving
at Scampley.
'Ah, Mr. Sponge!' exclaimed Mr. Buckram, who, having seen our
friend advancing up the little twisting approach from the road to his
house through a little square window almost blinded with Irish ivy, out
of which he was in the habit of contemplating the arrival of his
occasional lodgers, Doe and Roe. 'Ah, Mr. Sponge!' exclaimed he, with
well-assumed gaiety; 'you should have been here yesterday; sent away
two sich osses--perfect 'unters--the werry best I do think I ever saw in
my life; either would have bin the werry oss for your money. But come
in, Mr. Sponge, sir, come in,' continued he, backing himself through a
little sentry-box of a green portico, to a narrow passage which branched
off into little rooms on either side.
As Buckram made this retrograde movement, he gave a gentle pull to
the wooden handle of an old-fashioned wire bell-pull in the midst of
buggy, four-in-hand, and other whips, hanging in the entrance, a touch
that was acknowledged by a single tinkle of the bell in the stable-yard.
They then entered the little room on the right, whose walls were
decorated with various sporting prints chiefly illustrative of

steeple-chases, with here and there a stunted fox-brush, tossing about as
a duster. The ill-ventilated room reeked with the effluvia of stale smoke,
and the faded green baize of a little round table in the centre was
covered with filbert-shells and empty ale-glasses. The whole furniture
of the room wasn't worth five pounds.
Mr. Sponge, being now on the dealing tack, commenced in the
poverty-stricken strain adapted to the occasion. Having deposited his
hat on the floor, taken his left leg up to nurse, and given his hair a
backward rub with his right hand, he thus commenced:
'Now, Buckram,' said he, 'I'll tell you how it is. I'm deuced
hard-up--regularly in Short's Gardens. I lost eighteen 'undred on the
Derby, and seven on the Leger, the best part of my year's income,
indeed; and I just want to hire two or three horses for the season, with
the option of buying, if I like; and if you supply me well, I may be the
means of bringing grist to your mill; you twig, eh?'
'Well, Mr. Sponge,' replied Buckram, sliding several consecutive
half-crowns down the incline plane of his pocket. 'Well, Mr. Sponge, I
shall be happy to do my best for you. I wish you'd come yesterday,
though, as I said before, I jest had two of the neatest nags--a bay and a
grey--not that colour makes any matter to a judge like you; there's no
sounder sayin' than that a good oss is not never of a bad