JEMMY CLEVER. 101 



it would be scarcely possible to sketch. Like Robert Top, liis 

 favourite attitude was with his legs divided several inches 

 beyond the space his forked fellow-mortals usually allot, when 

 balancing themselves in an upright form, and his hands seemed 

 to possess an equally strong tendency mth those of the old 

 stud-groom to fathom the depths of his breeches pockets. 



"Well, my rumtyiddy-with-the-froth-on !" exclaimed Jack 

 one day, tickling me as usual under the flank until I lashed out 

 my heels against the boarding of the box with a violence which 

 seemed to please him excessively. " Well, my rumtyiddy-vrith- 

 the-froth-on !" repeated he, "to-morrow we begin again the 

 rounds to pick up the flats. What a game it is, sure??/ !" con- 

 tinued Jack ; " I %vin here, you win there ; all as nicely squared 

 as a pack o' cards. Sometimes / shall be put up, sometimes I 

 shan't ; but the thing's always made right with the guv' nor afore- 

 hand. If we're to lose, we're paid for it : if to win, it must be 

 made worth our while, so we goon as pleasant and safeas^;«2<sible." 



This brief revelation gave me a perfect insight into th«!» 

 plans and practices of Jemmy Clever and his associates. Nearly 

 every event at the^ provincial meetings to which I was taken 

 was previously arranged by " standing in," dividing the stakes, 

 and making the race a profitable certainty to all concerned. 

 Occasionally a difficulty arose when it was found that a horse 

 would be run on its merits ; but this occurred only now and 

 then, and seldom interrupted the harmony of the proceedings. 



From a total want of variation of interest in these races, in 

 ■which I had to play the many parts assigned to me, I shall not 

 enter more fully into the particulars of my tour of the provinces 

 than to state that I went from place to place, accompanied by 

 Jemmy Clever and Jack Swiggle ; and my iron-marked face 

 would have told those who knew me in earlier and happier days 

 how spiritless and careworn my taskmasters soon rendered me. 

 Instead of the former fire which glowed in my veins when pro- 

 paring for the start, I felt the degraded condition to which I 

 had fallen, and began to hate the sight of the flaring yellow 

 jacket in which I was so constantly ridden. This feeling, grow- 

 ing daily stronger, at length caused an unexpected check to the 



