a head to make up freight, and sold raw and
out of condition at Calcutta for Rs. 275. People who lost money on
him called him a "brumby;" but if ever any horse had Harpoon's
shoulders and The Gin's temper, Shackles was that horse. Two miles
was his own particular distance. He trained himself, ran himself,
and rode himself; and, if his jockey insulted him by giving him
hints, he shut up at once and bucked the boy off. He objected to
dictation. Two or three of his owners did not understand this, and
lost money in consequence. At last he was bought by a man who
discovered that, if a race was to be won, Shackles, and Shackles
only, would win it in his own way, so long as his jockey sat still.
This man had a riding-boy called Brunt--a lad from Perth, West
Australia--and he taught Brunt, with a trainer's whip, the hardest
thing a jock can learn--to sit still, to sit still, and to keep on
sitting still. When Brunt fairly grasped this truth, Shackles
devastated the country. No weight could stop him at his own
distance; and The fame of Shackles spread from Ajmir in the South,
to Chedputter in the North.
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