TRYING TWO-YEAR OLDS. 351 



we intend to ride the colts in their present trials, 

 and on the trial horse we will put our own jockey, 

 who is, as we have described, an honest man, and 

 in whom the strictest confidence may be placed. 

 Now, it may so happen from our best colt being 

 so very superior, that he may, in running the 

 trial at the weights and length mentioned, beat 

 the three-year old — the trial horse. The latter 

 may, unknown to us, have gone back some few 

 pounds; that is, he may not now be in as good 

 running form as we supposed him to be ; in 

 which case we could not say for certain, that our 

 colts had for the whole length of the trial ground 

 been gradually drawn out to the top of their pace. 

 To prevent our being deceived in this respect, 

 we will put in, to go with the colts in the trial, 

 a good four-year old, lightly weighted, and we 

 we will put upon him Charles, our head lad. But 

 we do not select this four-year old as having 

 any thing to do with the trial, but only to go up 

 near the head with the colts, so that in case the 

 trial horse should be getting beat near the con- 

 clusion, the four-year old may come on and finish 

 them at their best pace, without any attempt to 

 defeat them. 



We will now proceed to explain the method 



