UPON JOCKE YS. 229 



entire control over his insubordinate mount. Knowsley won in 

 a canter, and as he passed the Judge's chair, his jockey leant 

 back, according to his wont, in the saddle, and left the slackened 

 rein upon the horse's neck. There have been many Newmarket 

 jockeys who exemplified more forcibly than the Chifneys, 

 father and son, the truth of the Psalmist's axiom, ' So long as 

 thou doest well to thyself men will speak well of thee ; ' but two 

 finer horsemen were never seen upon the classic Heath. Their 

 names are inseparably connected with the Chifney rush 

 and the slack rein, and their style of finish was admirably 

 portrayed in the picture of Baronet, by Stubbs, with the 

 elder Sam Chifney upon his back. To explain his idea as to 

 the way in which a horse should be ridden the same jockey wrote 

 ' Genius Genuine,' in which the following passage occurs : 



As the horse comes to the last extremity, finishing his race, he 

 is the better forced and kept straight with manner, and with fine 

 touchings of his mouth. In this situation the horse's mouth should 

 be eased of the weight of his rein ; if not, it stops him more or less. 

 If a horse is a slug he should be forced by his rider's manner up to 

 this style of running, and particularly so if he has to make play, or 

 he will run the slower and jade the sooner for want of it. The 

 phrase at Newmarket is that you should hold your horse together 

 so as to ease him in running. When horses are in great distress 

 they cannot face that visible manner of pulling ; they must be 

 allowed to ease themselves an inch at a time as their situation will 

 allow. This should be done as though you had a silken rein as 

 fine as a hair, and were afraid of breaking it. 



Trained from his earliest childhood by an intelligent and 

 vigilant father, young Sam Chifney was the bean ideal of a long- 

 legged jockey. He was born in the autumn of 1786, and began 

 to receive lessons in riding from his father when no more than 

 three stone in weight. Many was the race upon a course of 

 300 yards, laid out under cover of the Warren Hill plantation, 

 in which the pair rode against each other, the elder on his 

 hack, and the boy upon a pony. 



Every phase of finishing (says ' The Druid ') was compressed 

 within the lesson. Sam would make running, and then his father 



