242 A TRIAL FOR MR. MERRY 



stayed at my place the whole of the week preceding it, 

 and to my knowledge, after the trial, the horse had but a 

 few canters ; work he may have called it, but not in my 

 opinion sufficient to enable so gross a horse, with such a 

 weight on his back, successfully to compete with others 

 properly trained. He failed partly from this cause, and 

 partly from the execrable riding of poor little Petitt 

 with the best intentions. He had not, if I remember 

 rightly, ridden for years before, and then but seldom (for 

 the Duke of Bedford). And on this occasion he entirely 

 lost his head, and rode his horse to a standstill. There 

 are plenty of men living who remember the circumstances 

 connected with the race ; how it rained incessantly for 

 days before, which made the ground very heavy going ; 

 the distance the horse led everything until near the win- 

 ning-post, when he was beat (by Knight of the Shire, 

 carrying 6 st. 2 lb.), stopping from sheer exhaustion, and 

 blowing like a porpoise on his return to the scales. Yet 

 in common fairness to Mr. Saunders, it should be stated, 

 even as he was, the horse would have won in the hands 

 of any competent jockey ; and probably would have won 

 with poor Petitt up, had the ground been in a state fit for 

 racing, and not the mud-pond to which it had been con- 

 verted by the late deluge. Therefore I would not too 

 severely criticise the method of his training, or rather, in 

 my humble opinion, the lack of it. Such is a fair account 

 of Hobble Nobles trial, and the disappointment which 

 followed it in the race itself. The simple fact is that the 

 horse could not stay over a mile. At and about that 

 distance he won a few races; but, like a good many 

 others, was never so good after he was a three-year-old 

 as he was at or before that age. 



Perhaps, naturally, the mention of this one trial brings 

 to mind another in which a difference of opinion occurred, 



