Other things being equal
(which, however, they generally are not), a bad, big horse fed on oats
offers a rather more difficult problem than a bad little horse fed on
grass. After Buffalo Bill's men had returned, I occasionally heard it
said that they had tried cross-country riding in England, and had shown
themselves pre-eminently skilful thereat, doing better than the English
fox-hunters, but this I take the liberty to disbelieve. I was in England
at the time, hunted occasionally myself, and was with many of the men
who were all the time riding in the most famous hunts; men, too, who
were greatly impressed with the exhibitions of rough riding then being
given by Buffalo Bill and his men, and who talked of them much; and yet
I never, at the time, heard of an instance in which one of the cowboys
rode to hounds with any marked success.[*] In the same way I have
sometimes in New York or London heard of men who, it was alleged,
had been out West and proved better riders than the bronco-busters
themselves, just as I have heard of similar men who were able to go
out hunting in the Rockies or on the plains and get more game than the
western hunters; but in the course of a long experience in the West I
have yet to see any of these men, whether from the eastern States or
from Europe, actually show such superiority or perform such feats.
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