62 ROAD, TRACK, AND STABLE. 



Running horses furnish, a spirited and beautiful sport, 

 but the runner can never be domesticated ; whereas 

 any man who owns a single horse may find himself 

 in the possession of a trotter, or at least of an animal 

 which he considers to be such, — and this comes to 

 nearly the same thing. The very beast who drags 

 a family carryall may, like the milkman's or the 

 baker's nag, prove worthy of a better fate. It must 

 be remembered that few horses trot fast naturally. 

 They require skilful driving and training ; often, also, 

 the judicious application of weights, boots, rollers, 

 and the like, in order to lengthen their stride or to 

 correct other imperfections in their gait. It is pos- 

 sible, therefore, for a horse to have " the making of 

 a trotter in him" during an indefinite period; and 

 so long as the owner refrains from putting his in- 

 choate racer to the test, his opportunity for boasting 

 about the animal's latent speed is almost unlimited. 

 Scoffers may throw cold water upon his pretensions, 

 but no man can assert absolutely that he is wrung. 



What, then, does a trotter look like ? That is a 

 question very hard to answer. Trotting horses range 

 in size and shape from Great Eastern, — a big, long- 

 legged horse, standing seventeen hands, who holds 

 the best saddle record, namely, 2.15f , — to Little 

 Dot, a pony of Morgan extraction, weighing six hun- 

 dred and seventy-five pounds, who was raised in Xew 

 Brunswick about twenty-five years ago, grew up with 

 a flock of sheep, was knocked about by a drunken 

 sailor, and finally, coming into the hands of a horse- 

 man, made a record of 2.26J. Nevertheless, there 

 are two or three trotting types. Frank Forester re- 

 marked that American trotting horses reminded him 



