THE TURF. 
riding beside his horses, and a groom, I believe it was 
old Cheevers, broke out into an exclamation, 'By G d, 
John, that's a fine lad!' 'Aye, aye,' replied Watson, 
highly satisfied ; ' you will find some time or other there 
are few in Newmarket that will match him.' It will 
not be amiss here to remark, that boys with straight 
legs, small calves, and knees that project but little, 
seldom become excellent riders. I, on the other hand, 
was somewhat bow-legged ; I had then the custom of 
turning in my toes, and my knees were protuberant. I 
soon learned that the safe hold for sitting steady was to 
keep the knee and the calf of the leg strongly pressed 
against the side of the animal that endeavours to 
unhorse you; and, as little accidents afford frequent 
occasions to remind boys of this rule, it becomes so 
rooted in the memory of the intelligent, that their 
danger is comparatively trifling." 
Of the comparative good and bad temper of race- 
horses, the dramatist thus speaks : 
" The majority of them are playful, but their gambols 
are dangerous to the timid or unskilful. They are all 
easily and suddenly alarmed when anything they do 
not understand forcibly catches their attention ; and 
they are then to be feared by the bad horseman, and 
carefully guarded against by the good. Very serious 
accidents have happened to the best. But, besides their 
general disposition to playfulness, there is a great pro- 
pensity in them to become what the jockeys call vicious. 
Tom, the brother of Jack Clarke, after sweating a grey 
163 
