88 A MIRROR OF THE TURF. 



that it can hardly ever again be depended on to 

 run. The modern trainer is usually a man of 

 some education and intelligence, a contrast to his 

 predecessor of sixty years since, who was simply 

 a groom and little more ; he knows the anatomy 

 and constitution of the horses placed under his 

 care, and is familiar with them in health and 

 disease. He has also to administer his establish- 

 ment with care and economy, and has to keep 

 up the discipline of his place ; he may be the 

 master probably of thirty or forty lads, whom it 

 is not easy to keep in order. 



A trainer who may, in the course of the 

 winter, find he has the favourite for the Derby, 

 or some other great race, in his stable, passes an 

 anxious time, more especially when those who 

 own the animal are addicted to heavy betting, 

 and "the horse has been backed to win a fortune" 

 in bets. To keep a horse in health demands the 

 unceasing attention of its trainer and his servants: 

 to see that its food and drink are of the best 

 quality, that its gallops are properly regulated, 

 that it is carefully housed, and that no improper 

 person obtains access to it, are duties that must 

 be performed with unceasing watchfulness. Some- 

 times, though a trainer be ever so lynx-eyed and 

 careful, he will be baffled, and will awake to the 

 sad consciousness, some fine morning about the 

 time fixed for a race, that the horse has been 

 *' got at " by some interested party, and rendered 

 useless for the coming event. 



Derby favourites have occasionally been 

 " nobbled," no one being able at the time to say 

 how. The blacksmith may have pricked it in 

 shoeing, its water may have been poisoned, some 



