You talk of riders on the flat, of nerve

You talk of riders on the flat, of nerve and pluck and pace — Yet not one in fifty has the nerve to ride a steeplechase. It's right enough while horses pull and take their fences strong, To rush a flier to the front and bring the field along. But what about the last half-mile, with horses blown and beat — When every jump means sudden death — with wife and child to keep — It needs some nerve to draw the whip and flog him at the leap. But Corrigan would ride them out, by danger undismayed — He never flinched at fence or wall, he never was afraid. With easy seat and nerves of steel, light hand and smiling face — He held the rushing horses back, and made the sluggards race. He gave the shirkers extra heart, he steadied down the rash. He rode great clumsy boring brutes, and chanced the fatal smash. He got the rushing Wymlet home that never jumped at all — He clambered over every fence and clouted every wall. You should have heard the cheers, my boys, that shook the members’ stand Whenever Tommy Corrigan weighed out to ride Lone Hand. They were indeed a glorious pair — the great, upstanding horse, The gamest jockey on his back that ever faced a course.