Read Ebook: The Horse in America A practical treatise on the various types common in the United States with something of their history and varying characteristics by Speed John Gilmer

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After the Gray Eagle-Wagner race, the next one that was watched with breathless interest by the whole country was the match at four-mile heats between Fashion and Boston for ,000 a side. This was run on Long Island in 1842, and both heats were won by Fashion, the time being 7.32 1/2 and 7.45. The time of this race, it will be seen, was an improvement on that of the Eclipse-Sir Henry race, and also on the time in the race between Gray Eagle and Wagner. It was called a match between North and South, and the North was again the winner. Fashion was bred in New Jersey, and was by Commodore Stockton's imported stallion Trustee out of the Virginia bred mare, Bonnets o' Blue. Boston came from Virginia, and was by Timoleon out of Robin Brown's dam by Florizel. Boston was a grandson of Sir Archy, and foaled in 1833. From the time of his training as a three-year-old until he met Fashion, six years later, he had campaigned all over the country and had meet with almost universal success. He was considered the greatest horse of his day, and there are many students of Thoroughbreds who to-day consider that he was the greatest influence for good of any horse ever bred in this country, greater even than his very wonderful son, Lexington.

The last great race--classic races, the turf writers call them--prior to the Civil War, was at New Orleans, between two sons of Boston--Lexington and Lecompte. The former was out of Alice Carneal by imported Sarpedon, the latter out of Reel by imported Glencoe. This race was in 1854 and, of course, at four-mile-heats, for the Great State Post Stakes. The city of New Orleans, the place of the race, was packed with visitors from all over the country. Lecompte won the two first heats, the time being 7.26 and 7.38 3/4 . Mr. Richard Ten Broeck, the owner of Lexington, was so dissatisfied that he tried to arrange a match with Lecompte. This came to nothing, so he issued a challenge to run Lexington against Lecompte's time, 7.26, which was the record. This challenge was accepted and the trial was made over the Metarie Course in New Orleans in April, 1855. The most famous jockey of the time, Gil Patrick, was taken from Kentucky to ride Mr. Ten Broeck's horse, and again the sporting world of the country crowded to New Orleans. Lexington beat the record, doing the four miles in 7.19 3/4 , and Mr. Ten Broeck was ,000 richer for his belief in his horse. There was at that time, and is now for that matter, a feeling that a record made against time is not so satisfactory as one made in an actual race, so the friends of Lecompte were not cast down by Lexington's performance. This trial against time took place on the 2d of April. On the 24th of April was to be run the Jockey Club Purse of 00, and both Lecompte and Lexington were entered. Mr. Ten Broeck and General Wells, the owner of Lecompte, bet 00 against each other, though in the general betting Lexington was the favorite at 0 to . A writer of the day thus describes the race:

"Both animals were in the finest possible condition, and the weather and the track, had they been manufactured to a sportsman's order, could not have been improved. At last the final signal of 'Bring up your horses' sounded from the bugle; and prompt to call Gil Patrick, the well-known rider of Boston, put his foot in Lexington's stirrup, and the negro boy of General Wells sprang into the saddle of Lecompte. They advanced slowly and daintily forward to the stand, and when they halted at the score, the immense concourse that had, up to this moment, been swaying to and fro, were fixed as stone. It was a beautiful sight to see these superb animals standing at the score, filled with unknown qualities of flight, and quietly awaiting the conclusion of the directions to the riders for the tap of the drum.

"At length the tap of the drum came, and instantly it struck the stationary steeds leaped forward with a start that sent everybody's heart into his mouth. With bound on bound, as if life were staked on every spring, they flew up the quarter stretch, Lexington at the turn drawing his nose a shadow in advance, but when they reached the half-mile post--53 seconds--both were exactly side by side. On they went at the same flying pace, Lexington again drawing gradually forward, first his neck, then his shoulder, and increasing up the straight side amid a wild roar of cheers, flew by the standard at the end of the first mile three-quarters of a length in the lead. One hundred to seventy-five on Lexington! Time, 1.49 1/2 .

"And so he was, for on entering the back stretch of the second mile the hero of 7.26 made his most desperate effort, reaching first the girth, then the shoulder, then the neck of Lexington, and finally, when he reached the half-mile post, laid himself alongside him, nose by nose. Then the mass, which during the few seconds of this special struggle had been breathless with hope and fear, burst into a shout that rang for miles, and amid the din of which might be heard here and there, 'One hundred even on Lecompte!'

"But this equality was only for a moment's term. Lexington threw his eye jealously askant; Gil Patrick relaxed a little of his rein, which up to this time he had held close in hand, and without violence or startling effort, the racer of racers stole ahead, gently, but steadily and surely, as before, until he drew himself a clear length in the lead, in which position they closed the second mile. Time, 1.51.

"Again the hurrah rises as they pass the stand--'One hundred to seventy-five on Lexington!'--and swells in wider volume when Lexington increases his one length to three from the stand to the turn of the back stretch. In vain Lecompte struggled; in vain he called to mind his former laurels; in vain his rider struck him with the steel; his great spirit was a sharper spur, and when his tail fell, as it did from this time out, I could imagine he felt a sinking of the heart as he saw streaming before him the waving flag of Lexington, now held straight out in race-horse fashion, and anon nervously flung up as if it were a plume of triumph.

"'One hundred to fifty on Lexington!' The three lengths were increased to four, and again the shout arose, as in this relative condition they went for the third time over the course. Time, 1.51.

"The last crisis of the strife had now arrived, and Lecompte, if he had any resources left, must call upon them straight. So thought his rider, for the steel went to his sides; but it was in vain, he had done his best, while, as for Lexington, it seemed as if he had just begun to run. Gil Patrick now gave him a full rein, and for a time as he went down the back stretch, it actually seemed as if he were running for the very fun of the thing. It was now 0 to on Lexington, or any kind of odds, but there were no takers. He had the laurel in his teeth and was going for a distance.

"But at this inglorious prospect Lecompte desperately rallied, and escaped the humiliation by drawing himself a few lengths within the distance pole, while Lexington dashed past the stand, hard in hand, and actually running away with his rider--making the last mile in 1.52 1/4 and completing the four in the unprecedented time of 7.23 3/4 , I say unprecedented, because it beats Lecompte's 7.26, and is, therefore, the fastest heat ever made in a match."

I have taken pains to transcribe this account of the race for a double purpose. This race fixed Lexington's place as the best horse in the country and it was also his last public appearance. Then, again, I think it interesting to show how the reporters of half a century ago dealt with an important sporting event. After this race Lexington was taken back to Kentucky and covered thirty mares without being thrown entirely out of training. It was Mr. Ten Broeck's intention to take the horse to England and race him there. Unfortunately, exactly how even Mr. Ten Broeck never knew, the horse was over-fed just before a long gallop and went blind, so he never faced a starter after his contest with Lecompte at New Orleans. Mr. Ten Broeck and Mr. A. J. Alexander meeting in England, where Mr. Alexander had gone in search of a stallion for Woodburn, a bargain was struck and Lexington changed hands for ,000. There never was a horse in Kentucky, or in the world for that matter, that was held in such esteem as was Lexington. The feeling for him was actually one of reverence. I remember being taken to see him when I was a boy by my father. We felt and acted as though we were visiting a shrine. When the sightless veteran was brought from his box it was the most natural thing in the world for us to remove our hats. A few years before I had been taken to the White House to see Mr. Lincoln. Upon my word Lexington to me at the time seemed the greater and more impressive of the two.

This best four-mile record of Lexington lasted for nineteen years, when one-quarter of a second was clipped from it at Saratoga by Fellowcraft, a colt by imported Australian out of Aerolite, a daughter of Lexington. This only lasted two years, when at Louisville it was beaten by Ten Broeck, by Mr. Ten Broeck's imported Phaeton, the dam being Fanny Holten by Lexington. Ten Broeck's time was 7.15 3/4 . Mr. Ten Broeck, by the way, was the first man to take American horses to race in England. He met with moderate success and thoroughly persuaded the English that we had first class horses in this country. His Prioress ran fifth for the Goodwood Cup, much to the chagrin of the Americans who had backed her heavily. Even the "Autocrat at the Breakfast Table" preached a charming sermon on the occasion. It was left for Mr. Pierre Lorillard and Mr. Keene to win classic events on the other side, the Derby for one, the Grand Prix and Oaks for the other. Lexington's great influence as a sire was rather through his daughters; when bred to imported English sires they were wonderfully successful in producing winners. The name of Lexington probably recurs more frequently than that of any other horse, except his own ancestors, in American Thoroughbred genealogies.

Footnote 4:

This splendid sire was not appreciated in Kentucky until after his death. Lexington lost his eyes through neglect, and Phaeton actually lost his life. So Mr. Ten Broeck had bad luck with the two best sires he ever owned. But Lexington's loss of his eyesight was probably America's gain, for it is very unlikely, if this great horse had ever gone to England, that he would have been suffered to return.

During the Civil War the breeding of Thoroughbreds was severely interrupted, as in Kentucky and the South generally there were sterner things to be done. Besides, the armies were always looking for horses without any prejudices against Thoroughbreds, and the guerrilla bands had an absolute fondness for them. It did not cease, but languished. Immediately afterwards it started again, there being many new importations from England, and in 1866 Jerome Park was opened and a new era in racing began. In this new era the first horse to catch the popular affection was Harry Bassett, by Lexington out of Canary by imported Albion. This horse was the people's idol, and whenever he was to run the accommodations of the race-course were all too small to hold the crowds. As a two and three-year old he won all of his engagements, except the first, in which he started, when a blunder at the post took away his chances. Although bred in Kentucky, the Kentuckians sought a horse to clip his laurels, and the choice fell on old John Harper's Longfellow, by imported Leamington, dam Nantura . The two met at Long Branch for the Monmouth Cup, two miles and a half, in July, 1872. Longfellow won so easily that it was difficult to believe that Harry Bassett was at his best. And he was not, for two weeks later at Saratoga, for the Saratoga Cup, two miles and a quarter, Bassett won. One of Longfellow's plates became twisted after he had gone a mile and a half, and for the remaining distance the horse had the entire use of only three feet. They never met again. In the stud Longfellow was a great success, and Bassett practically a failure. The whole country watched for intelligence of these two races, and they proved conclusively that the old-time sporting blood of the people was as rich as it had been in the earlier years.

Between 1870 and 1880 the coming of the modern type was clearly indicated, but the horses that were raced in that period were certainly grand specimens. The Bonnie Scotlands were at this time particularly strong. Among these Luke Blackburn, Glidelia, and Bramble were probably the best. It is a pity that Bonnie Scotland did not have a better chance in his earlier career. When he arrived in America it was at Boston, whence he was taken to Ohio. It was only in 1872 that he joined the stud of the Belle Meade Farm in Tennessee. He lived only a few years later, but in 1882 the winnings of his get led the list. It was during this period that Mr. Keene sent Foxall to Europe, where he won the Grand Prix de Paris, was second to Bend Or for the City and Suburban, won the Cesarewitch and other great stakes. Then there were Falsetto, Duke of Magenta, Duke of Montrose, Aristides, Eolus, Grenada, Grinstead, Himyar, Kingfisher, Monarchist, Sensation, Springbok, Tom Ochiltree, Uncas, Virgil, and Spendthrift, the latter seeming to me to best represent the virtues of the old and the new-fashioned horse than any other of this middle period. But Bramble was the most useful of them all, being up to any weight and ready to start every day in the week.

The present period may be said to have begun at Coney Island in 1880. There have been so many wonderfully fast horses developed in this twenty-five years that even to enumerate them and their breeding would take a book by itself. The chief characteristics of the breeding, however, may be said to be in the larger infusions of the English blood, the English having gone into the racing machine business before we did. I shall have to content myself with going along very rapidly now, and mention only those horses and events that have enduring prominence. One of these horses was Hindoo, by Virgil, the winner of many of the greatest stakes, and the sire of Hanover and many another star performer. Thora, by Longfellow, was one of the greatest fillies that ever looked through a bridle, and as a matron is one of the exceptions to the rule that hardly worked race-horses rarely reproduce themselves in their offspring. Miss Woodford, by Billet out of Fancy Jane, came along about this time, and was so splendid a racer that she was more than once barred in the betting as invincible. In 1884 was foaled Hamburg, by Hindoo out of Bourbon Belle. This horse outclassed all of his time, winning thirty-two races out of fifty starts, was thirteen times second, three times third and unplaced only twice. His dam was by imported Bonnie Scotland. We also had Firenzi, Troubadour, The Bard, and Emperor of Norfolk. Among the most notable contests was that between Salvator and Tenny in 1890, over the Coney Island Jockey Club track. Salvator won the Suburban and a challenge was sent by Tenny's owner for ,000 a side. Mr. Haggin, Salvator's owner, accepted. Murphy rode Salvator, and Garrison had the mount on Tenny. When the distance was half over it seemed Salvator's race in a gallop, but Tenny made up lost ground in the last half, and Salvator won by only half a head. The first mile had been run in 1.39 3/4 , while the mile and a quarter was covered in 2.05. Mr. Haggin, who is said to be the most laconic and imperturbable man alive, is reported to have remarked, with a sigh of relief when the race was finished: "Uncomfortably close." After this match Salvator made one more distinguished appearance. This was at Monmouth Park, where, in a mile straight away, he ran against time and covered the distance in 1.35 1/2 . Salvator was by imported Prince Charlie. Salvator was not a success in the stud.

In 1893 appeared another popular champion in Mr. Keene's Domino, a son of Himyar out of Mannie Gray. Domino was the perfection of what I have called a racing machine. He won the Futurity at two years old, carrying 130 pounds, but by a very narrow margin. As the chestnut colt Dobbins, by Mr. Pickwick, had carried the same weight and seemed to have gained on Domino in the last few strides, there were many, Dobbins' owner included, who thought Dobbins the better colt. So it was arranged that they should run a match over the Futurity course, each carrying 118 pounds. They ran like a matched team the whole distance, and the judges not being able to separate them, it was declared a dead heat. The heat was not run off. Domino made a clean sweep of his first season. The next year he went amiss, and was retired to the stud. Though he only had one or two seasons in the harem, he was a success, and his name will be perpetuated in the American Stud Book.

The next great horse after Domino was Hamburg, by Hanover out of Lady Reel by Fellowcraft. This was a phenomenal race-horse during a long career, and his get are now doing him honor on the turf. The colts by imported Watercress have been most distinguished, and one, Waterboy, was the star of his year. Indeed, the horses now winning the laurels seem to be mainly by imported sires, though Ben Brush and Hamburg appear to be holding their own as sires.

The Morgan horse is the most distinctive reproducing native type in America, and has been so since the family was recognized as a type in Vermont some seventy-five years ago. For symmetry, docility, intelligence, sturdiness, and speed, the Morgans have been justly famous and have met with the approval of good judges of horse-flesh during the whole of their history. They reached their highest fame during the two decades between 1850 and 1870. After that, both as a type and as a family, they came near perishing, a victim to the desire, which merits the name of craze, to produce trotting horses of phenomenal speed by means of crossing and recrossing with the Hambletonian blood. That there is a revival of Morgan breeding is an excellent thing for the country, for the Morgan is about the best all-round, everyday, general utility horse that this country has had and probably as good as any type in the world.

The renascence of the Morgan horse is due to the horse shows, which have become deservedly popular in many parts of the United States. There are those who speak of the horse shows rather contemptuously as society fads in which the horses exhibited are of secondary importance and interest. To many, who care nothing about horses and know less, it is doubtless true that the social side of horse shows is the important, if not the only side. This attitude, even if it be the attitude of the majority of those who attend the exhibitions, does not detract from the value of the shows so long as the work in the ring be of the right sort, and high standards be established and maintained as to the various classes of horses that are produced in this country. Indeed, it is a good thing for the shows that people with no fondness for or taste in horses should still patronize them, for their money helps pay expenses and makes it possible to offer the handsome prizes which go along with the awards. If the horse shows had done nothing else than stimulate the renewed effort to re-establish the Morgan type they would have served a purpose far from vain.

Twenty years or so ago, when the horse shows began to take the place of the old-time county fairs, the driving horse that was popular in the United States was the Standard Bred Trotter, which usually traced back to Messenger through Hambletonian, who has been celebrated with such insistence of praise as the great begetter of trotters that the majority of Americans believe all that has been said of him as the actual and indisputable truth. It is not a grateful task to destroy established and well-liked fictions, so for the moment I shall pass the Hambletonian fiction by, and devote myself to telling about horses of superior breeding, better manners, higher courage, greater symmetry and above all, a prepotency of blood which reproduces itself in offspring from generation to generation, so that we have in the Morgans an easily recognized and most valuable type. Before going on with my story, however, I must disavow any intention to detract from the merits of those who have bred and trained the wonderful trotters that have, year by year, been clipping seconds off the mile record until the two minute mark has been passed. At the same time I wish to insist that the breeding and training of these phenomenal animals should be left to the very rich, just, for instance, as yacht racing is. The breeding of trotters is far from an exact science, as the trotter, as such, is not a reproducing type, and only two or three in a hundred of the standard breeds ever go very fast, while more of the fast horses among them pace than trot. They are not a type in conformation, in action or in gait; they come in all sizes and all shapes, and are not to be judged by the two or three per cent that develop speed. Moreover, they do not pay. Counting the cost of the ninety-seven or ninety-eight per cent of failures, I venture to say that the production of each successful trotter must cost in the neighborhood of ten thousand dollars. Lottery prizes, when lotteries were in vogue, were as high as that; but buying lottery tickets was never considered a good commercial enterprise. I sincerely hope, however, that rich men will continue to breed for extreme speed, as they can afford such costly and interesting experiments. The breeder, however, who wishes to make his stock farm pay, and the ordinary farmer who raises a few colts annually will surely find a more profitable business in trying to secure high-grade Morgans than in pursuing the elusive course which frequently leads to bankruptcy by the well-known Hambletonian road.

The founder of the Morgan type was a horse born somewhere about 1789, and was the property of Justin Morgan, who kept a tavern in West Springfield, Massachusetts, until he moved to Randolph, Vermont, in the year the colt that has perpetuated his owner's name was foaled. I have examined all the testimony available as to the pedigree of this first Morgan horse, and I must say with regret, but with entire respect for those who have gathered the evidence, that none of it seems to me quite convincing. This was the conclusion of Mr. D. C. Linsley, who published a valuable book in 1857, called "Morgan Horses." Mr. Linsley in his book printed all the stories and traditions about the breeding of the Justin Morgan with candid impartiality, but he did not decide that any was correct. According to these stories the first Morgan was anything from a Thoroughbred to a Canadian pony. Recently Col. Joseph Battell, of Middlebury, Vermont, himself a breeder of Morgans and the editor and publisher of the "Morgan Horse and Register," has re-examined all the records extant as to the owner of the first Morgan horse, and he announces, with a thorough belief in his conclusions, that the horse was a Thoroughbred, got by Colonel De Lancey's True Briton out of a daughter of Diamond, also a Thoroughbred. According to the Battell pedigree, Justin Morgan had many infusions of the blood of the Godolphin Barb, the Darley Arabian, and the Byerly Turk, and was worthy to be registered in the stud book established by the Messrs. Weatherby, in England. Indeed, Colonel Battell personally told me that he thoroughly believed in the accuracy of this pedigree, adding, however, "that while the evidence is strong enough to transfer property on, it would not hang a man."

As I said before, none of the evidence seems quite convincing to me. And no wonder. This horse died in Vermont in 1820, and not until nearly thirty years after was there any systematic effort made to trace his pedigree. During his life he was known only in his own neighborhood where, notwithstanding his acknowledged value as a stallion, he was used the greater part of every year as a common work horse. My own belief is that this horse was very rich in Arab and Barb blood, but not an English Thoroughbred. He had, so far as his history has been told, none of the Thoroughbred characteristics. Nor had his descendants. But whence his ancestors came and where he was born or when are not matters of so much importance as the indisputable fact that his progeny now for a hundred years have had similar excellent characteristics and have remained a fixed type, through good and evil repute, so that we know by what we can see to-day that the old stories and songs of our grandfathers as to the strength, the speed, the beauty and the courage of Morgan horses were more than mere songs and stories--they were the truth put into pleasing form.

This founder of the type, when the property of Justin Morgan, who, after he gave up tavern keeping in Massachusetts, became a schoolteacher, a drawing and music master in Vermont, was called Figure. When the produce of his sons began achieving fame, and the family and type needed a distinctive name, he was called after his old owner , Justin Morgan. His most famous son was Sherman Morgan, though there were eight or ten others of his colts kept entire, and the progeny of them have found place in the Morgan Register. Mr. Linsley's description of the first Morgan is worthy of transcription:

"The original, or Justin Morgan, was about 14 hands high and weighed about 950 pounds. His color was dark bay, with black legs, mane and tail. His mane and tail were coarse and heavy, but not so massive as has sometimes been described; the hair of both was straight and not inclined to curl. His head was good, not extremely small, but lean and bony, the face straight, forehead broad, ears small and very fine, but set very wide apart. His eyes were medium size, very dark and prominent, with a spirited but pleasant expression, and showed no white round the edge of the lid. His nostrils were very large, the muzzle small and the lips close and firm. His back and legs were perhaps his most noticeable point. The former was very short, the shoulder blades and hip bones being very long and oblique, and the loins extremely long and muscular. His body was rather round, long and deep, close ribbed up; chest deep and wide, with the breast bone projecting a good deal in front. His legs were short, close jointed, thin, but very wide, hard and free from meat, with muscles that were remarkably large for a horse of his size, and this superabundance of muscle exhibited itself at every step. His hair was short and at almost all seasons soft and glossy. He had a little long hair about the fetlocks and for two or three inches above the fetlocks on the back sides of the legs; the rest of the limbs were entirely free from it. His feet were small but well shaped, and he was in every respect perfectly sound and free from every sort of blemish. He was a very fast walker. In trotting his gait was low and smooth, and his step short and nervous; he was not what in these days would be called fast, and we think it doubtful if he could trot a mile much, if any, within four minutes, though it is claimed by many that he could trot it in three."

So we see that the founder of this great type was, whatever his breeding, a pony of most admirable conformation. In his performances he was the most remarkable horse in the neighborhood of his owner. He won against all comers in the various contests that were indulged in by the somewhat primitive sportsmen of the Green Mountain State. He won at walking, trotting, and running and also at pulling. Besides he was in great demand on muster day as the mount of the commanding officer, who would make a great show on this elegant, graceful, and intelligent horse. So we see the founder was exactly what the Morgans have been and are to-day, a good all-round, general utility horse. And his progeny have been like him. Many of them, however, have been much larger and much faster as trotters, and, as we shall presently see, a breeder of Morgans stands as much chance to produce a very fast trotter as he who breeds with speed alone as his ultimate object.

Justin Morgan was in the stud for more than twenty years in Vermont, and became the father of many sons and daughters. How many sons were kept entire is not known. Mr. Linsley mentions only six, but Colonel Battell accounts for twelve or fourteen on "information more or less reliable." Of the daughters we have very little direct information, but that there were many and that they had a great influence on the stock of New England, and particularly of Vermont, is inevitable. The records of most of the sons as sires have not been kept with either fullness or certainty, and the evidence is usually speculative rather than exact. This as a rule; sometimes, however, it is exact. This is the case with some of the progeny of Sherman Morgan, Bulrush and Woodbury Morgan. As to the others--Brutus, Weasel or Fenton Horse, Young Traveler or Hawkins Horse, Revenge, the Gordon Horse, the Randolph Horse, and one or two that went to the neighborhood of Boston--the records are not satisfactory. For instance, here is the kind of story that was once current. Revenge was in the stud at Surrey, New Hampshire, in 1823. The dam of the famous Henry Clay by Andrew Jackson was the noted mare Lady Surrey, foaled about 1824. She was said by some to be sired by Revenge. Mr. Randolph Huntington, the historian of the Clay family of horses and the staunchest advocate of their merits, does not endorse this, as he says that Lady Surrey was a Kanuck, and brought to New York with twelve other horses from the neighborhood of Quebec. Had she been the granddaughter of the original Morgan, the fact would hardly have escaped Mr. Huntington, who has also always been a believer in the Morgan blood. But there is very little profit in discussing or analyzing these old stories. There is no mortal way of getting at the truth, and we can do little more than grant that many of them are not impossible. What is important is that in the course of three horse generations the Morgan was a fixed and reproducing type in Vermont, a type which had attracted the attention of breeders and horsemen all over the country to such an extent that commissioners were sent, even from Kentucky, to examine and report upon the stock.

Sherman Morgan was foaled in 1808, his dam being a Rhode Island mare taken to Vermont in 1799. Of her pedigree nothing is certainly known, but Mr. Sherman, her owner, spoke of her as of Spanish breed, which means that she was, in all probability, a Barb. Her high quality, docility, speed, spirit and stamina have been testified to in unusually trustworthy fashion. She was taller than Justin Morgan, but her colt, Sherman Morgan, was not so tall even as his sire, being only 13 3/4 hands high, and weighing only 925 pounds. He was worked hard as a young horse on a farm, and for many years also driven in a stage from Lyndon, Vermont, to Portland, Maine. His team mate was another son of Justin Morgan, and the "little team" was famous at every inn between the two ends of the route. In that section Sherman Morgan was the champion runner in the matches at short distances then frequent in the locality. This horse was also known for a time as "Lord North," but there was no effort to disguise the facts as to his correct lineage. The change of name indicates that in 1823 the true value of the horse as a sire was not fully recognized. He died in 1835, some twenty of his sons being kept entire. As in the case of Justin Morgan we have no records of the females that sprung from Sherman Morgan. His sons averaged 14 3/4 hands, the average weight being 1020 pounds. Here was distinct improvement in the third generation, and clear evidence also of the prepotency of the blood, together with the value in breeding of the Arab blood when transplanted.

Sherman Morgan's most famous son was Black Hawk, foaled in 1833, his dam being a large black mare of unknown breeding, but fast and superior in quality. Those who had owned the mare said that she was from New Brunswick or Nova Scotia and of English stock. The pedigree manufacturers--Wallace, particularly--insist that she was a Narragansett pacer, with the evident idea of bolstering up their contention that all fast trotters owe their capacity to trot to the pacing capacity of their ancestors. As not two per cent of Morgans ever pace, including the descendants of Black Hawk, this contention is preposterous, to say the least. Black Hawk's son, Ethan Allen, was a magnificent roadster, and his great speed in trotting matches did harm, I think, to the perpetuation of the Morgan type, for the Morgan breeders began making efforts to get fast trotters rather than to preserve the type, with the result that there was, in the course of twenty or thirty years, a distinct falling off in the interest that was felt in these very superior horses. Ethan Allen was foaled in 1849 at Ticonderoga, New York, and his dam was said to be an inbred Morgan. The colt certainly had all the Morgan characteristics, and was the fastest stallion of his day, trotting three heats with a running mate when he was eighteen years old in 2.15, 2.16, and 2.19. He was also the most popular public performer of his day; and at that time trotting was more attractive to the people in America than running. "No one has ever raised a doubt as to Ethan Allen being the handsomest, finest-styled and most perfectly-gaited trotter than had ever been produced," was said by the "American Cultivator," in 1873. He was a bright bay, a trifle less than 15 hands, and weighed 1000 pounds. He was the sire of a great many colts and fillies, but being kept in training the better part of his life he never had so good a chance as some other horses to become famous as an ancestor. Through his sons, Honest Allen and Daniel Lambert, his name and that of his sire have been kept very much alive in the records, for his descendants have been fleet in the track and most successful in the show ring. His daughters and granddaughters have also done him proud, proving the excellence of the Morgan blood as brood mares. It is only when we get to his generation that the chroniclers take much notice of the importance of the females in perpetuating the Morgan type and family. Honest Allen spent the last ten years of his life at Lexington, Kentucky, and he was mated with many of the best mares in that section, his son, Denning Allen, out of Reta, a granddaughter of Black Hawk, proving himself one of the best speed producing sires the country has had, one of his colts, Lord Clinton, being marvelously fast and courageous.

Woodbury Morgan was the largest of the stallion sons of the original Morgan. He was 14 3/4 hands, and usually weighed about 1000 pounds. He was in the stud in Vermont for twenty years, and at twenty-two was taken to Alabama, where he died from an injury received in disembarking from the ship that carried him. His sons and daughters in New England helped materially to increase the fame of the type, as they were larger than the other branches of the family, and had in a great degree the characteristic virtues--fearlessness, elegance, speed, stamina, and docility. Three of his sons--Gifford Morgan, Morgan Eagle, and Morgan Caesar--became famous sires, their sons, grandsons and great-grandsons being reckoned among the best horses in America. One of the grandsons of Gifford Morgan was Vermont Morgan, the sire of Golddust, a horse which established one of the most noted and valuable families of the Morgan strain. Golddust was foaled in Kentucky in 1855, and was at his best during the Civil War, his opportunities being very much curtailed by the unsettled and distressing social conditions which prevailed in the neighborhood where he was owned. But he was a wonderful horse, and having received through his dam another fresh infusion of Arabian blood, his sons and his daughters were rich in that potent quality, without which no equine family or type has ever, in the last few centuries at least, been valuable or permanent. Golddust's dam was by Zilcaadi, an Arabian horse given to United States Consul Rhind by the Sultan of Turkey. The Golddusts were speedy horses, but speed was not their chief virtue. If Mr. Dorsey, of Kentucky, had not been handicapped by the prevalent prejudice held by the purchasers of roadsters against any other than Hambletonians as fast trotters, he would have been able to perfect a better type of carriage horses than we have in this country, and have got, also, many very fast trotters. Golddust did get fast trotters, but his bent was certainly in another direction which was not followed. He was 16 hands high, and weighed 1250 pounds. He was a bright gold in color--hence his name--and the perfection of symmetry, while his action left nothing to be desired.

The third of the sons of Justin Morgan to establish a distinct Morgan family was Bulrush Morgan foaled in 1812, and living to the great age of thirty-six years. The breeding of the dam of Bulrush Morgan is not known, but she is said to have been a French mare, which I take to mean that she was brought into Vermont from French Canada. This horse left a great many descendants, and they were all singularly alike, generally being deep bays and browns with dark points and a general freedom from any marks, such as white feet or white spots in the face. They were noted also for the absence of spavins and ring bones. They were fast, good all-round horses--good on the road and in the field, in harness and under the saddle. They did not particularly attract the attention of trotting horse people until Bulrush Morgan's great-grandson, Morrill, began a family of many branches--the Winthrop Morrills, the Fearnaughts, and the Dracos--all of much distinction in that field where fast mile records are considered the highest test of merit.

Suppose that we were to concede that phenomenal speed was the one test of merit for a driving horse and then examine the records. We should find that the majority of the really phenomenal trotters from Ethan Allen's time till now had in their breeding rich infusions of Morgan blood. As I have said before, Ethan Allen, with no other than Morgan blood that we can account for, was the fastest stallion of his time, and the most popular performer on the trotting tracks, even eclipsing the famous Flora Temple in his ability to excite the enthusiasm of sportsmen by the evenness of his work, the smoothness of his gait, his endurance and courage, and that intelligent docility which made him seem to know in every emergency exactly what he was called on to do. In his great race in 1867, at the Fashion Course on Long Island, when, with a running mate, he met the fleet Dexter, who had taken from Flora Temple her long-maintained fastest record, we are told that forty thousand people had assembled to witness the contest, and the betting was 2 to 1 in favor of Dexter. In Wallace's "Monthly" of ten years later, there was a description of the race that I venture to reproduce:

"When the horses appeared upon the track to warm up for the race, Dexter, driven by the accomplished reinsman, Budd Doble, was greeted with a shout of applause. Soon the team appeared, and behind sat the great master of trotting tactics, Dan Mace. His face, which has often been a mask to thousands, had no mask over it on this occasion. It spoke only that intense earnestness that indicates the near approach of a supreme moment. The team was hitched to a light skeleton wagon; Ethan wore breeching, and beside him was a great, strong race-horse, fit to run for a man's life. His traces were long enough to fully extend himself, but they were so much shorter than Ethan's that he had to take the weight. Dexter drew the inside, and on the first trial they got the 'send-off,' without either one having six inches advantage. When they got the word the flight of speed was absolutely terrific, so far beyond anything I had witnessed in a trotting horse that I felt the hair raising on my head. The running horse was next to me, and notwithstanding my elevation in the grand stand, Ethan was stretched out so near the ground that I could see nothing of him but his ears. I fully believe that for several rods at this point they were going a two-minute gait.

"It was impossible that this terrible pace could be maintained long, and just before reaching the first turn, Dexter's head began to swim, and the team passed him and took the track, reaching the first quarter pole in 32 seconds, with Dexter three or four lengths behind. The same lightning speed was kept up during the second quarter, reaching the half-mile pole in 1.04, with Dexter further in the rear. Mace then took a pull on his team and came home a winner by six or eight lengths in 2.15. When this time was put on the blackboard the response of the multitude was like the roar of old ocean."

The team also won the next two heats in 2.16 and 2.19, and Wallace is of opinion that the team might have won the first heat in 2.12 had it been necessary. This enthusiastic description of Ethan Allen's performance was written before Wallace "took a brief" for the Hambletonians. Then he belittled the Morgans in every way, and when reminded of his previous admiration of Ethan Allen, expressed a doubt of his Morgan ancestry. But the Morgans have kept on going fast, when it has happened to be their nature so to do, and that really is as much as can be said of any horses. The dams of the following remarkable performers were of Morgan breeding:--Jo Patchen, Dan Patch, Sweet Marie, Major Delmar, and Lou Dillon, while the only trotting inheritance of Rarus, Fearnaught, and Lord Clinton was from Morgan forebears. The Morgans can go fast enough. There is no doubt about that. But that is not their chief value or their highest merit. Probably not a much greater percentage of Morgans would go phenomenally fast than of Standard Bred Trotters with no Morgan strain, though such a proposition has not been proved; but the Morgans are what the Standard Bred Trotters are not--the Morgans are of a definite reproducing type, and whether they trot in 3.30, 2.30, or 2.00 minutes, they have their typical excellences to recommend them and to give them a value, which no other horse type in America can approach, because they are the best, most symmetrical, most elegant and most docile harness horses in the world, with a stamina and a courage that none but Thoroughbreds approach.

So much importance has been attached to this matter of speed with track records, that I felt obliged to dwell on it somewhat in my discussion of the Morgans. It is really, however, much more interesting than important. The important thing is to get a breed of horses ninety per cent of which can go with reasonable speed, showing a clean, square trot and graceful high action, and when at top speed be free of clicking or forging or interfering, performing in this manner, moreover, without boots or hobbles and without effort, and also without tiring even when the road is long. And in the Morgans we have such a type. That there should ever have been any danger that they might have perished through neglect is a curious chapter in the history of this country. It does not properly belong in this place, but to that other chapter which relates to the chicanery, the delusions and absolute forgeries which are so interwoven with the history of the Standard Bred trotter that good men believe in them though they have been pointed out again and again with elaborate detail and circumstance.

The Morgans are being bred in many parts of the country, more of them being in the Middle and far West, probably, than in Vermont and the rest of New England. Their blood is closely blended with many of the families of the Kentucky saddle-horses, and goes far in giving finish to that remarkable type, which now furnishes mounts for the great army of American park riders, while pretty nearly all the show winners in the saddle classes come from two or three counties of the beautiful Blue Grass State. The adaptability of the Morgan blood to other crosses is a strong argument in favor of its Arab origin. That its prepotency has continued so long is another argument in favor of the theory that there was other Arab blood brought by the female lines. These speculations and surmises we cannot prove, but as there is now a register we can know about the latter generations, the good qualities of which will, no doubt, show us that we were fortunate in saving this invaluable type before it was too late and madness had done its final work of extermination.

One of the most important events in the early horse history of this country was the landing from England in 1788 of the Thoroughbred stallion Messenger, a gray horse that had had some success on the turf in the old world, but was scarcely what might be called great as a race-horse. He was brought over here to be the sire of runners, and he was, to an extent, as both his sons and daughters were good performers. His greatest place in the Thoroughbred records is due to the fact that he was the sire of Miller's Damsel, the dam of American Eclipse, the horse that upheld the honor of the North in the great contest when Sir Henry represented the South. But before Messenger's death it had been recognized that when he was bred with the mares of the American basic stock, the produce had a disposition and a capacity to trot faster than was then at all usual. Naturally, therefore, he was used to further this end as much as to sire runners, though there was nothing like a trotting turf in those days, the contests being on the roads under saddle and for considerable distances.

Messenger's sire was Mambrino, by Engineer; Engineer was by Sampson, and Sampson by Blaze; Blaze by Flying Childers ; and Flying Childers by the Darley Arabian. This is pretty good breeding, as any one will say who is familiar with the early English records as kept by the Messrs. Weatherby. But even Messenger's title to be a Thoroughbred has been bitterly disputed by the controversialists of recent time, this controversy having been precipitated and intensified when, in the effort to get faster trotters, it was proposed to put in more Thoroughbred blood. The leader of the opposition to more Thoroughbred blood was an able and ingenious writer who has never had his equal in manufacturing pedigrees to suit his own theories, and at the same time please the interests of those who hired him to bolster up the merits of the stock they were breeding to sell. He maintained that the dam of Sampson, the grandsire of Messenger, was a pacing mare, and hence Messenger's capacity to transmit the trot to his progeny. He further affirmed that the trot and the pace were the same gait; but of this I will speak later when I get to the Standard Bred Trotters. Now, as a matter of fact, the Godolphin progenitor of Messenger through the female line was a Barb, and Barbs are apt to pace, though if Thoroughbreds pace I have yet to see one.

So many fictions have grown up about Messenger that he seems more like a hero of romance than a flea-bitten gray horse of not very fine finish, and worth, according to the records of sales, in the neighborhood of 00. Indeed, the record of his landing is so obscure that I have not been able to determine whether it was in New York or Philadelphia. But he was in the stud for nineteen years and left many sons and daughters. He was kept in various places--near Philadelphia, on Long Island, in Orange County, New York, and in New Jersey. But in each neighborhood he made an impression on the horses that came after him, an influence which seems to have been both good and enduring.

Trotting and pacing racing in America had been popular even before Messenger's coming, and long before his get and their get appeared on the road. But the matches were neighborhood affairs and attracted only local attention. There was absolutely no effort at organization and the construction of trotting tracks until many years later. What racing there was was in the hands and under the control of gentlemen; how much interest they took in these trotting and pacing matches I do not know. But not much I fancy, for caste in America was stronger and more separating than it is now, when, if we put the "mighty rich" in a class by themselves there is very little at all. It was not until between 1820 and 1830 that horses were trotted on tracks, and then there was little, if any, of this mile heat business to see really how fast a horse could go for a short distance. What the people of that elder day seemed to be most interested in was how far a horse could trot at a good rate of speed. I will not tire my readers with a recital of the fictions of the contests on the roads of Long Island and Harlem, but begin with the race of Lady Kate under the saddle against time. Her task was to go fifteen miles in an hour. This she did and easily. Nor does it seem much of a task when we consider that a few years later Andrew Jackson was doing mile after mile in much less than three minutes. This horse, by the way, was so superior to the trotters of the time that his owner could make few matches with him. His speed and endurance frightened the others off, and there was little, if any, rivalry. We find it recorded, however, that Paul Pry, in 1833, beat time in an effort to go sixteen miles to the hour, and Hiram Woodruff, then a boy, expressed the opinion that this horse could then have gone twenty miles in the hour. This same old driver tells of a horse which he thought was one of the most superior he ever knew, Top Gallant, by Messenger. This fellow, in his twenty-second year, went four four-mile heats in time very fast for that day. A little later appeared Dutchman, who, in a race of three-mile heats against Rattler, went the distance in 7.45 1/2 , 7.50, 8.02 and 8.24, Dutchman won the first and fourth heat, Rattler won the second heat, while the third was a dead heat. Here we see the first heat was trotted at the rate of 2.35, which was surely very fast going, considering the distance, the vehicles used and the shoeing. But such journeys are now considered too far.

Lady Suffolk, an inbred Messenger, was spoken of for a while as the Queen of Trotters, and she was a remarkably good one both in breeding and in performance. She was sired by Engineer II, by Engineer, a son of imported Messenger; her dam was by Don Quixote, son of Messenger. So it will be seen that she was closely inbred to Messenger and had as much of the Thoroughbred blood as any trotting horse of remarkable performance. She was a gray, and was foaled in 1833 on Long Island. She began trotting when she was five years old, and had a remarkably successful career. She trotted 138 races, winning eighty-eight times and receiving forfeit three times. When she was twelve years old, at Beacon Course, Hoboken, she trotted the second heat of a five-heat race in 2.29 1/2 , which was the first time 2.30 had been passed, and was, of course, the record. In 1849 she made a saddle record of 2.26. She was bred to Black Hawk in Vermont, but the colt was prematurely born, and she left no descendants. Although this record was reduced in 1849 to 2.28 by Pelham, a converted pacer, another second was knocked off in 1853 by Highland Maid, also a converted pacer, there was nothing in the way of trotters to take the great place of Lady Suffolk until Flora Temple, the queen of them all, came along about 1850, and proceeded to beat all that attempted to rival her for speed and courage.

When I was a boy, Flora Temple was considered almost as great as Lexington. In Kentucky at that time, her wonderful performances, her speed and her courage were considered all the more remarkable from the fact that no one knew how she was bred, and inferred that she had no breeding that was good. This was not a fair inference. Her appearance, her gameness, her fighting qualities, together with her nervousness, all indicated that she was a high-bred animal. To say what that breeding was is another matter. So a pedigree was fixed up for her. On the plate published by Currier and Ives when she was at the very zenith of her fame, her pedigree was set down as follows: "Sired by one-eyed Kentucky Hunter, by Kentucky Hunter; dam Madam Temple by a spotted Arabian horse." I have no doubt that this pedigree is as arrant nonsense as was ever put in print, and was simply made up to put on the advertisements of the races in which she was entered. I doubt, even, whether there was any serious effort to trace her pedigree when she was a filly, for it was not until she was five years old that she attracted the attention of a horseman and he bought her for 5, and sold her quickly for 0. Previous to that she had been used in a livery stable, though I recall a tradition that she had been used in a milk cart.

So we can take our choice of pedigrees. If Flora Temple had been born a few years later the Hambletonian advocates would surely have claimed her. It has always been a wonder to me that they did not, after all, assert that she was of collateral blood. When her new owner brought this most remarkable mare to New York, he had not the most remote idea that he held one of the wonders of the world. He believed that she was a pretty good pony, and could strike a good clip on the road. She was only 14.2 hands high and had a mere stump of a tail. Besides, she was nervous, and before she "found herself" had a rather choppy action. When she had learned the trick, however, her action was smooth and clock-like, and she glided along with almost unapproachable grace. Moreover, when she broke she lost scarcely nothing, as she did not have to be pulled back almost to a standstill, but caught her trotting stride from what was very like a run.

There are other books in which the record of Flora Temple can be found in all of its proud and brilliant details. She beat everything of her day, beginning with the Waite Pony on the Bloomingdale road in 1850, until Ethan Allen, Princess, George M. Patchen and all the good ones had to take her dust. She was not used under the saddle, but always to sulky or wagon. Hiram Woodruff, her first real trainer, says she was a great weight puller and was not in the least bothered by a 350 pound wagon, but went along with it as merrily as though she were in a racing sulky. Her first defeat was in 1853 by Black Douglas, a son of Henry Clay; but a few months later she had her revenge and beat the Clay stallion with apparent ease. In 1856 she took the trotting record away from Highland Maid by covering a mile in 2.24 1/2 . The record remained with her for eleven years; she reduced it in 1859 to 2.19 3/4 , and so she was the first to trot better than 2.20, as Lady Suffolk was the first to go below 2.30. In 1859 the little bay stump-tail mare was at the very zenith of her fame, though Hiram Woodruff was of opinion that the next year she might have surpassed this. The next year the Civil War broke out and she, not being in good form, was retired to the breeding farm of Aristides Welch, near Philadelphia.

During the two or three last years of her public life, Flora Temple had nothing to beat, so she was sent all over the country "hippodroming" with Princess and George M. Patchen, variously. On the farm she dropped a few colts. Two were by sons of Hambletonian, and one by imported Leamington. They have not done much to perpetuate her prowess. My own idea is that in selecting mates for her the great cardinal principle of breeding: "like begets like," was utterly disregarded. The blood of a Hambletonian was probably too cold to mate with hers, though we do not know what hers was, and Leamington's conformation was too great a contrast. Though she has left no descendants that do her particular honor, she has left by her performances imperishable fame as the greatest trotter of her day, and her day lasted for more than a dozen years.

There was a lull in trotting during the Civil War, just as there was in racing, but after the war the trotting tracks became even more popular than the running courses--not the most fashionable, but the most popular. Fashion has never forsaken the running horse, and probably never will; but in the main, the trotting races have been patronized and managed by men of a slightly different social status. To be sure, there are notable exceptions, exceptions so notable, indeed, that they ought to be sufficient to lift the ban from the trotting world; but they have never been able to do it. And even during the ten years after the Civil War, when trotting was immensely popular, it was considered slightly a reproach to be interested in the sport. It was during this period that Dexter took the trotting primacy away from Flora Temple, and the tribe of Hambletonian came into such prominence that the legislators who framed trotting-match rules, established a register and made laws fixing a standard entitling a stallion or a mare to a place in these sacred books. And so the "Standard Bred Trotter" came into being, and his has been a long day--his advocates and admirers say a great day.

After Dexter, in 1867, took away from Flora Temple the trotting record by doing a mile in 2.17 1/4 , his reputed sire, Rysdyk's Hambletonian was held in such high esteem by those trying to breed fast trotters, that they considered any horse not by him or of his breed to be not in the least worth while in any attempt to improve these light harness horses. So it is quite impossible to treat of the Standard Bred Trotters without also treating of Rysdyk's Hambletonian. There are many who do not, and never have, agreed with the Hambletonian admirers, and as I am one who once believed in the fictions as to his breeding and other excellences, I propose to be perfectly fair by giving both sides of the story of a horse that cuts a most considerable figure in American horse annals. Now, here is one side of the Hambletonian story, and I take the liberty of quoting from Mr. Hamilton Busbey, a noted writer on trotting horses, and the editor of a paper devoted to trotting horse interests. He says:

"Lewis G. Morris bred a mare by imported Sour Crout to Messenger, and the produce in 1806 was a bay colt who developed into a horse of 16 hands, and is known to history as Mambrino. He was never trained in harness, but was a natural trotter. Betsey Baker, the fastest mare of her day was sired by him. Amazonia, a snappy chestnut mare of 15.3 hands, showing quality, but of untraced blood, and who could trot to 2.50 was bred to Mambrino, and whose outcome was Abdallah, whose register number is 1. He was bred by John Tredwell, of Saulsbury Place, Long Island, was foaled in 1823, and developed into a bay horse of 15.3. As a four-year old, he trotted a mile in 3.10, but was not kind in harness, and was principally used under saddle. He made seasons on Long Island, in New Jersey, and in Orange County, and spent 1840 in the Blue Grass Region of Kentucky. In 1830 he passed to Isaac Snediker, and after many changes of fortune died of starvation and neglect on a Long Island Beach, and was buried in the sand....

"The Charles Kent mare was a bay of 15.3 hands, foaled in 1834, with powerful stifles, and as a four-year old trotted a mile under saddle in 2.41. She was by Bellfounder, a Norfolk trotter of 15 hands, imported from England to Boston in 1822, by James Bort. Imported Bellfounder was foaled in 1815, and the blood of his sire, Bellfounder, is at the foundation of the hackney breed. One Eye, a determined mare by Bishop's Hambletonian , out of Silvertail, a hardy brown mare by Messenger, was the dam of the Charles Kent mare, who found a happy nick in Abdallah.

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