I consent to your saying
"blood horse," if you like. Also, if, next year, we send out
Posterior and Posterioress, the winners of the great national four-
mile race in 7 18.5, and they happen to get beaten, pay your bets,
and behave like men and gentlemen about it, if you know how.
[I felt a great deal better after blowing off the ill-temper
condensed in the above paragraph. To brag little,--to show well,--
to crow gently, if in luck,--to pay up, to own up, and to shut up,
if beaten, are the virtues of a sporting man, and I can't say that
I think we have shown them in any great perfection of late.]
- Apropos of horses. Do you know how important good jockeying is
to authors? Judicious management; letting the public see your
animal just enough, and not too much; holding him up hard when the
market is too full of him; letting him out at just the right buying
intervals; always gently feeling his mouth; never slacking and
never jerking the rein;--this is what I mean by jockeying.
- When an author has a number of books out a cunning hand will keep
them all spinning, as Signor Blitz does his dinner-plates; fetching
each one up, as it begins to "wabble," by an advertisement, a puff,
or a quotation.
- Whenever the extracts from a living writer begin to multiply fast
in the papers, without obvious reason, there is a new book or a new
edition coming.
Pages:
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46
47
48
49
50
51
52