Old Time Thoroughbreds by Rolf Boldrewood — Read

When the sons of Woden are admitted into Valhalla, it will be an incomplete Elysium for some of us, maugre the perennial flow of ale and the esthetic fancy of the goblets, unless the good steed Hengst, whom we have so loved on earth, be permitted resurrection. Alick and Jimmy Hunter would miss Romeo. Could Cornborough be excluded from any realm of bliss which contained 'Dolly' Goldsmith? How superior were those grand horses, not to mention The Premier and Rory O'More, in all their attributes to the average human individual, about whose title to such noble immortality there is no question. I cannot believe that they are doomed to extinction, to eternal oblivion. They are dead and gone, doubtless. But lest any reader of these memories should lack future opportunity of feasting his eyes upon those wondrous equine shapes, I essay faintly to recall their leading characteristics.

Romeo, son of Sir Hercules and Pasta, was a golden chestnut, with a narrow blaze and white hind legs. Originally imported to Tasmania from England, he was in 1842 located at Miamamaluke Station on the 'Devil's River' in Victoria, then the property of the Messrs. Hunter. He died in my possession some years later, and, as I used to look at him for at least half an hour every day for the first few months of ownership, I may, without presumption, attempt a pen-and-ink portrait.