UPON JOCKEYS. 225 



once no uncommon sight to see daily at Newmarket ten or a 

 dozen wasting jockeys returning from an eight-mile walk, thoroughly 

 exhausted. Now, such a thing is scarcely known. Jockeys were 

 then to be seen riding over Newmarket Heath with a light saddle 

 round their waist, in their boots and breeches, carrying their own 

 saddles to the scales, and saddling their own horses. Now, most 

 of them ride in carriages to the course dressed as gentlemen in the 

 very height of the fashion, and having their horses saddled for them. 

 What would such jockeys think of riding from Exeter to Stockbridge 

 on a small pony with their light saddle tied round their waist after 

 the races, and arriving at the latter place in time to ride there ; and 

 then starting in the same fashion for Southampton races? Mr. 

 Montgomery Dilly and my father both did this, when boys, for 

 two consecutive years. Old Mr. Forth, as a boy, used to rise from 

 his bed and walk wasting during the night, in order to keep himself 

 light, besides doing his daily work. And when my father trained 

 he often wasted by walking on the downs while the horses were 

 taking their exercise, which is much more tiring than walking on 

 the road. And yet with all his riding, and with one hundred horses 

 under his charge, he had no one to wait upon him neither valet, 

 amanuensis, nor clerk. Similar cases might be given by scores ', 

 but enough has been said to show how great is the change for the 

 worse, not only as regards the physical capability of, but the in- 

 clination to exert themselves in, the jockeys of the present day. 



* Take that silly gimcrack away, and bring me a plain snaffle.' 

 Such were the words employed by Sam Chifney the elder, when 

 the Prince Regent, at the close of last century, sent a horse 

 called Knowsley, whom he had bought in Yorkshire, to 

 Guildford, to run for the King's Plate. Knowsley was one of 

 the hardest pullers that ever looked- through a bridle, and had 

 run away in the north with every jockey that crossed him. 

 Great doubts were expressed as to the ability of old Sam Chifney 

 to manage such a refractory brute, and many of the Prince's 

 friends went down to see the fun. The horse was brought out 

 with a tremendous curb bridle such as the Mexicans use for 

 breaking their bronchos in his mouth ; but was sent back to 

 his stable with the contemptuous request that a simple snaffle 

 should be substituted for the curb. Sam Chifney then got 

 into the saddle, and it became evident at once that he had 



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