RECALCITRANT JOCKEYS. 169 
incompetence of the boys that rode them. Mozsy was beaten 
with five stone four pounds on him, and won the Dee Stakes 
with eight stone seven pounds in the hands of a man in the 
commonest of canters, and beating such horses as Lord 
Alfred, Lady Tatton, Corebus, and other good ones at even 
weights the same week, 
I think it is clear that such riders can only enrich the book- 
maker, who has the chapter of accidents in his favour; and 
that to their employer, who is obliged to stand or fall by the 
solitary object of his choice, these performances mean nothing 
but ruin to all but millionaires. 
There is another difficulty with jockeys in our day which 
has yet to be described. We have seen that the urchins put 
up to ride have not always the power to do as they should, 
even when they have the desire. But there are other cases in 
which riders can and ought to do their duty, but when, by the 
wilful disobedience of the legitimate instructions of their em- 
ployers, they render racing no longer a science, but a game of 
chance on a par with hazard, and make the opinion of the 
tyro equal to that of the sage. Happily such cases are few; 
but that they do occur with both boys and men, there is 
evidence as ample as there is certainty that, with the latter at 
least, such a thing should never be. 
I allude to races in which “a declaration to win” has 
been made. 
If an owner runs two horses in a race, he has a right to 
declare with which of the two he will win ; that is, supposing 
that the one he selects can beat all the other horses in the 
race except his stable companion. On such occasions, we 
sometimes see the jockey who is riding the other horse come 
and win, when the animal concerning which the declara- 
tion has been made is second, in open defiance of positive 
