326 STEEPLE-CHASING. 



Considering how important may be the issues involved, the 

 judicious rider will cast a careful eye over the horse before he 

 mounts. Saddles do occasionally slip and bridles have been 

 known to come off in the course of a race. The trainer, or his 

 assistant who saddles the horse, is extremely sorry ; but it is the 

 rider who runs the risk of breaking a collar-bone, if nothing 

 worse, while all this might very likely have been averted had 

 the rider looked to see that all was right. 



Unless a man is upon his own horse, whose disposition he 

 knows thoroughly well, he will receive instructions how to ride, 

 and these he must obey to the best of his power ; but, if a grave 

 mistake has not been made in asking him to ride at all, a certain 

 amount of discretion must be allowed him. 



It may be, for instance, that staying is not the horse's strong 

 point, and, there being known stayers in the race, the rider will 

 be told to wait. If, however, the horse struggles violently for his 

 head, it may be better to indulge him for a little way, and then 

 get him gradually under easier control again, than to let him ex- 

 haust himself, to say nothing of his jockey, by fighting. Unless 

 the course is very broad indeed, so that there is ample room for 

 the field, it is, as a rule, perhaps advisable in the short two-mile 

 chases now so much in vogue to keep well in front for the 

 first two or three fences — supposing, that is to say, that the rider 

 is on what is known to be a safe jumper. It is not improbable 

 that some of the competitors may refuse, and they are more 

 likely to do so early in the race, for there are often raw chasers 

 that have been insufficiently schooled, with more or less success, 

 over their own training-grounds, but grow so flurried and excited 

 at the unusual turmoil of a racecourse that they forget the little 

 they have learned and cannot or will not jump. The horse 

 that happens to be galloping behind the refuser is likely to be 

 more or less upset in one way or other — either thrown down, or 

 so balked that he will also refuse. The leader will likewise have 

 a tendency to block the following horse's view of the fence he 

 is approaching. 



The inexpert chaser, again, is most likely to fall before he 



