152 THE RACING WORLD 



proof of the starter's incompetence. Occasionally 

 one or two horses will even swing round when the 

 webbing flies up, and that again is supposed to be 

 the starter's fault. It men would only come down 

 to the starting-post and really see what happened, I 

 should not mind any condemnation they might be 

 pleased to level at me it starts were bad ; but I 

 can only get the animals standing still in a line ; 

 and because some strike the ground more quickly 

 than others, some dwell, and some swerve, so that 

 when the leaders have gone a hundred yards there 

 is a big gap between them and the hindmost, it is 

 cruelly hard that the starter should be blamed, as 

 he so frequently is. 



The starter's duties are so obvious that I do not 

 think there is much to be said about them which is 

 not almost universally known. In the old days the 

 jockey who was first at the post took up the 

 position he liked best — which of course, as a 

 general rule, was on the rails — and the others 

 sorted themselves as chance, luck, and impudence 

 admitted. Now there is a draw for places. The 

 clerk of the scales has a little bag of ivory discs with 

 numbers on them, and when the jockeys are all 

 weighed out each draws a number from the bag. 

 A list is made or these and handed to the starter, 

 supposing him to be in the weighing-room ; for 



