TRAINERS AND JOCKEYS. 25 



made any better by a change of stables ; and in fact, 

 if the first trainer has had the animal since it was a 

 yearling, they are often made worse. We seldom 

 hear of a horse going blind during his training, 

 although Phantom, Sweetmeat, and several other 

 good horses have done so when it was over ; and on 

 the whole, blindness is not nearly so prevalent in 

 England as in Ireland, which is attributed by some 

 to the much dryer climate. Robson's system, like 

 that advocated by Sir Charles Bunbury, was far 

 from being a severe one ; and his horses were full of 

 vigour and muscle, and by no means low in flesh. 

 The Chifneys professed to be great admirers of his 

 regime, but their practice and profession hardly cor- 

 responded; still their brilliant luck with horses whose 

 constitutions would permit of their being always sent 

 along, procured them many copyists. Their rivals 

 represented them as giving Priam eight-mile sweats ; 

 whereas they affirmed that owing to his being a narrow 

 light-fleshed horse, he was seldom sweated more than 

 three miles once a-week, and without his clothes. 

 John Bay, senior, was one of the admirers of strong 

 sweats, more especially in his treatment of two-year- 

 olds ; but his notions have become very much modi- 

 fied of late years. His son John never held them, 

 and stands up so stoutly for strong walking exercise, 

 as to furnish grounds for a joke to the effect that 

 Pyrrhus the First did nothing else in the 25 days 

 between the Newmarket Stakes and the Derby. 

 William Day is popularly supposed to adopt the 

 severe system ; but be this as it may, we do not think 

 that we ever saw a horse brought to the post in 

 more perfect form than Lord of the Isles was for the 

 Two Thousand. " Grandfather Day" used to train 

 at Houghton Down, where he was right ably assisted 

 by his fine old Saxon dame, who knew as much 

 about condition and farriery (strangles was her great 

 subject) put together, as the ablest member of the 



