TRAINERS 13 



shall be engaged and which of the engagements they 

 shall fulfil. Making entries, striking horses out of 

 stakes for which they are not to run, sending them 

 about the country in all directions, finding jockeys to 

 ride, are all duties which require anxious care ; and 

 then there are the yearling sales at Ascot, Newmarket, 

 Doncaster, and elsewhere. Some owners recruit their 

 stables entirely from sales, nearly all buy occasionally ; 

 and it is part of a trainer's business very critically to 

 look over what is to be sold, estimate the value of the 

 animals, and advise as to what may judiciously be 

 bought. The opinions of experts, it may be remarked, 

 differ very widely on the subject of yearlings. Some 

 trainers — good judges and in all honesty — will strongly 

 recommend their employers to buy horses which other 

 trainers — equally capable men and actuated by the best 

 motives — regard as worthless, and beg" their masters 

 not to bid for. This may be partially due, no doubt, 

 to prejudice against sires or dams or strains of blood ; 

 there may be a suspicion, more or less well founded, 

 that the stock of a certain horse exhibit a tendency to 

 " make a noise," that the progeny of a certain mare are 

 "soft," that hereditary bad temper will break out, or 

 that some defect is likely to show itself; but, apart 

 from this, in examining the animal one trainer will see 

 some fault — coarse hocks that threaten to be curby, 

 badly shaped feet, a jowl which suggests roaring, light- 

 ness of bone, uprightness, hocks too far back, want of 

 length, or one of a score of weaknesses which will 



