ASCOT AND GOODWOOD 77 



of manners on the part of the horse. A sharp jockey who 

 has all his wits about him, and who is able to note what 

 is taking place in a race, is seldom shut in, provided his 

 mount is a smooth and generous goer ; but if he is riding 

 a bad-mannered, hard-mouthed horse, that horse will pull 

 him into difficulties, no matter whether he is racing on a 

 round or a straight course, and such animals will often be 

 shut in at a critical moment, however great the artist who 

 has the mount. 



Goodwood gets on well enough without a straight mile; 

 but all its courses are good of their kind, and the going 

 of the very best. Lord George Bentinck was at great pains 

 in making the present course some sixty years ago, and 

 he left no stone unturned in his endeavours to procure a 

 suitable track. In all probability the turf was good to begin 

 with, but a perfect system of top-dressing was carried out 

 over a period of years, and, good as the turf may have been 

 in its pristine condition, it was improved to a very great 

 extent. The grass is shorter, closer, and of finer quality 

 than that which covers Newmarket Heath, and in suitable 

 weather its appearance reminds one of a well-kept lawn 

 rather than a range of open downs, at a high altitude above 

 sea-level. 



That Goodwood has been a fashionable and popular 

 meeting for the greater part of the present century I need 

 hardly state, and even in these days of great opposition it 

 fairly holds its own, though, as is only natural, its former 

 glories have in some measure departed. Not more than a 

 quarter of a century ago the Newmarket Meetings, Epsom, 

 Ascot, Goodwood, and Doncaster stood out by themselves 

 as the greatest of the year, and between Ascot and Good- 

 wood there were no more important fixtures than the one 

 meeting then held at Newmarket in July, the Stockbridge 

 and Bibury Club fixtures, and such affairs as Newcastle- 

 on-Tyne and Liverpool, both of which were much more 

 local than they now are. The racing world has not stood 

 still, however, in the last five-and-twenty years, and now, 

 in addition to the meetings just named, and a second 

 July Meeting at headquarters, there is racing at Sandown, 



