OF FARRIERY. 



417 



of which are but fevv), who acts according' to 

 reason and common sense, and whose brains 

 do not He in his guts (pardon me this vulgar 

 expression,) and his guts lie in his head ; for 

 they are fond of good living. 



" There is a certain cant term, and method 

 of speaking, amongst these most ignorant fel- 

 lows, which I ever despised, when I was on 

 the turf When a gentleman has matched 

 his Horse at the Jockey Club, he tells his 

 trainer what he has done, and asks his opinion 

 on the match ; the trainer replies, ' I think 

 your honour has got to windward of the flats,' 

 or some such low vulgar and low-bred igno- 

 rant expression ; — although this fellow knows 

 tliat your Horse is so bad a racer, that, pro- 

 vided he be matched (giving weight) against 

 a common post-horse, he will be troubled to 

 beat him. His interest is not whether you 

 lose, or win, your match ; his intcr^|kis, to 

 encouragre vou to continue on the turi^^nd to 

 persuade you, that your Horses are much 

 better than they really are ; for, if he were 

 honest enough to tell you, that, out of ten 

 Horses you had in your stable, you had but 

 one Horse which could be called a racer — then 

 every man, who was not bigoted to his own 

 obstinate folly and ignorance, would send 

 every Horse in his stablts to the hammer, ex- 

 cepting that one Horse, to be sold for what 

 they would be knocked down at. But this 

 does not suit or agree with the trainer's in- 

 terest. He lives by the sieve, and by the 

 sieve only, together with the money you pay 

 fur the boy's board and lodging, who exercises 

 your Horse ; and by this, and by this only, 

 they accumulate, in time, good fortunes. 



" It is by the sieve, and by the sieve ma- 

 terially, they make their fortunes. Every 

 time they shake the sieve, to feed your Horses, 



it is to their profit. Generally speaking, they 

 srive one Horse as much exercise as the other, 

 whether, from his nature, he carries more or 

 less flesh. Can anything be so absurd, as to 

 see all the young colts, coming three years 

 old, brushing along, as it is termed, after the 

 aged Horses, many of them carrying heavier 

 lads, than the aged Horses? I am certain, 

 that most of the delicate Horses, which, by 

 nature, do not carry so much flesh as others, 

 are overtrained and considerably weakened 

 by being immoderately sweated. Every 

 Horse should be sweated acording to his con- 

 stitution, and the quantity of flesh he makes. 

 I am certain, that nine in ten would run better 

 provided they went gently for the last three 

 or four days." 



Lord Coleraine was confederate on the 

 Turf with his friend, Mr. Robert Pigott, wheo 

 his celebrated Horse (Shark) was at his best ■, 

 Mr. Pigott, trusting the whole management of 

 his stables to him. 



" I do not believe there ever was a better 

 Horse than Mr. Robeit Pigott's Shark, ex- 

 cepting Eclipse, which was a very uncommon 

 Horse. I will tell you what Shark could do, 

 by which you may give a tolerably good guess 

 whether you have nearly the best Horse of 

 his year. Run five or six of your young colts 

 together, one mile : if they all come in well 

 together, you may be sure that not one of 

 j them is worthy to be kept in training, except- 

 ing you have one amongst them, which is an 

 uncommonly large sized colt, large limbed 

 and loose made. It is possil)le that, when he 

 comes to his strength, and fills up, he may 

 turn out a good Horse. If you have one colt, 

 which, in the trial, runs clear away from all 

 the rest, you may expect that he will turn out 

 a good runner. Take him, about a fortnight 

 5 N 



