WAITING. 383 



tactics, according to circumstances, with the utmost prompt- 

 ness. When we consider that the time for action often allows 

 only two or three seconds during which to calculate the 

 various chances and to resolve what to do, we shall cease 

 to wonder that this jockey instinct, or intuitive power of 

 grasping the situation, combined with quickness and courage 

 to act, is as rare a mental faculty as genius in any other walk 

 of life. Possibly, a dozen men in England who can ride 

 8 St. 7 lb. possess it ; probably, not as many. 



WAITING. 



As a rule, in all fairly long races, a jockey should wait ; 

 for by doing so, the horse will not incur the risk of being 

 run to a standstill, and the rider, seeing how the other 

 horses are going, can form a good judgment as to the advisa- 

 bility of remaining, for the present, where he is, or of going 

 to the front. If he injudiciously forces the pace from the 

 start, he will probably not find out his mistake until the race 

 has been lost. 



A capital jockey who had not the reputation of always 

 riding to win, once told me that he learned to appreciate the 

 advantages of waiting, from observing the manner in which 

 horses that made the running " came back " to him, when he 

 was on animals which had no chance, and of which he did not 

 make very much " use." 



If the orders be to wait, they should not be carried out, as 

 is sometimes done, by losing the start, or by pulling the horse 

 out of his stride, in order to get him behind at all hazards. A 

 jockey with waiting orders should, on the contrary, get away 

 as well as possible, and should settle down as soon as he can 

 into a steady, uniform pace, a trifle slower than that of 

 those who are " making play," and should wait until they 

 " come back " to him or until he arrives at the spot from 

 which he sees that it is time to make an attempt to recover 



