THE TROTTING-HORSE OF AMERICA. 189 



came slashing in ahead was never hardly heard on any other 

 occasion at the Beacon. Jack Harrison hugged me, and 

 tossed his hat up in the air. The odds swung right over. 

 It had been a hundred to five, and no takers, on Confidence ; 

 and now a hundred men shouted all together, " A hundred 

 to fifty on Kipton ! " 



Again I kept the little horse jogging until it was time to 

 start. He won the fourth heat, taking the lead at the start, 

 and not being headed in it. The time of it was 2m. 39s. 

 The fifth heat was a mere repetition of the fourth. Ripton 

 won it easily in 2.41. This was the second race that he had 

 won against odds of one hundred to five ; and, at this dis- 

 tance of time, I say, with all confidence and without egotism, 

 that he would not have won it but for the decided " persua- 

 sion " he got between the second and third heats. The 

 horse was old and partly crippled, and it don't answer to go 

 to coddling with such a one when the race is in hand. He 

 had to have something to wake him up, and let him know 

 that real business was to be transacted, and he must " do or 

 die," as the saying is. 



A word here may not be out of place in reference to in- 

 structions from owners or backers of horses to drivers. If 

 the horse is strange to the driver, the latter is in need of all 

 the instructions the other parties, who are supposed to know 

 something, can give. But it commonly happens that the 

 driver knows the horse quite as well, and a little better, than 

 they do ; and, furthermore, he generally knows something 

 of the opposing horses in the race, which is a very material 

 consideration in determining the method which ought to be 

 pursued. In this case of Eipton's, and in that in which I 

 drove Prince the chestnut horse against Hero the pacer 

 ten miles, the horses could not have won if the instructions 

 I received had been carried out to the end. Yet the gentle- 

 men who gave them had experience in such matters, and 

 were rather remarkable for sagacity, than the reverse. It 

 ought to be considered that the instructing of a driver in a 



