276 IOWA DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE 



registers, and was formerly owned by A. T. Cole at Wheaton, 111. He 

 has been a consistent winner for many seasons and has never appeared 

 to better advantage than he did in this show. It seems proper to say 

 that Mooers must be a remarkable care taker and conditioner, for all 

 his horses are in fine fettle, have that rare bloom of perfect health 

 and good spirits, and are singularly free from unsoundness and blemishes. 

 This is the more remarkable when it is considered that several of the 

 horses in his stable are real old-timers that have served a long career on 

 the tanbark and some of which were thought to have become second 

 raters years ago. There is Gallant Lad, ex-member of that famous stable 

 of Lawrence Jones, of Louisville, winning frequent championships and 

 being about as frequently "gaited," or getting nothing, all of a decade 

 ago, and having an unenviable reputation as an outlaw that must be 

 permitted to have his own way and on no account to be crossed and in 

 the hands of Will Roberts, one of Kentucky's most adroit horsemen, he 

 now parades under the name of The Count, and Mooers must be given 

 credit for having broken him, for, although he occasionally manifested 

 his old-time propensity to war dance instead of trot, he stood quietly 

 enough when lined up and submitted to having ribbons placed on his 

 brow band without the least indication of his sometime former habit of 

 plunging through the judges' box just as they had about decided to give 

 him a blue string. Nor has whatever process that has been applied to 

 his rejuvenation been one that constituted breaking his heart, for he 

 has frequent flashes of that old-time brilliancy of action, speed and air 

 that made him, in the old days, a real champion when his evil disposition 

 did not operate to his disaster. Two other members of the former Jones 

 stable are still in Mooers' hands, Royal Regent and John Alden, the 

 latter now being called Chocolate Soldier. The Spring Maid, in the 

 handsome bay mare that was formerly owned by the former well-known 

 horse show exhibitor, Mrs. Jarvis Hunt, of Chicago. She is now nine 

 years old, and her breeding is: Sire, Rene Russell; dam, Genola, by 

 General Hancock. Hallie's Comet is the Maid's mate in the pairs, and I 

 know nothing about him. Pick of the Basket and Dainty Maid are two 

 new ones that Mooers bought somewhere last winter. They are said to 

 be Hackneys, the former out of a mare by the great trotting sire. 

 Chimes. They are a very nice pair with finished action, step and man- 

 ners. Mr. Mooers had the invaluable assistance in showing his horses 

 of Mrs. Mooers' driving, and she is certainly one of the most capable 

 reinsmen before the public, and one of the greatest ring generals, know- 

 ing just what to do, when to do it, and when to stop doing it. In a 

 number of classes, the daughter. Miss Charlotte Louise, drove, this show 

 constituting her debut in horse show circles, and she made a very graceful, 

 charming picture, and not at all an inadequate contender for the highest 

 honors. In one point Mooers seems to be open to criticism (though per- 

 haps not more so than some other exhibitors), and that is in the 

 inordinate length of toe which he inflicts upon some of his horses. It is 

 creased by excessive length of foot, and some of Mooers' horses, as, for 

 example. The Spring Maid, had so much too much foot that it was almost 

 certainly a long since exploded fallacy to think that high action is in- 



