278 THE TROTTING-HORSE OF AMERICA. 



fully justified the confidence of her backers ; and I might 

 dismiss the subject by saying that she distanced Tacony the 

 first heat. But this was a very remarkable race, inasmuch 

 as Flora surpassed in it any time that had been made before, 

 either under saddle or otherwise. It was also the last race 

 in which I drove her ; and it was made a matter of accusa- 

 tion against me that I had distanced Tacony, and purposely 

 exposed the fast time of which Flora Temple was capable. 

 Impartial and intelligent people, as well as those who were 

 interested, and so perhaps not quite impartial, believed this. 

 It was so set down in the contemporaneous accounts of the 

 press ; and yet it was not true. I might have contradicted 

 it through the " Spirit of the Times " at that period, but I 

 did not do so ; and many believe to this day that I purposely 

 drove the mare to the full extent of her capacity on that 

 occasion. 



Now, nothing is further from the truth. I have never in 

 my life lost a heat purposely that I could have won without 

 what I deemed might be too great an effort for safety in the 

 race ; and I have never, on the other hand, exposed all that 

 any horse was capable of, unless it was necessary. In the 

 race between Flora and Tacony, the condition of the mare 

 was very fine, and her speed very great. She darted away, 

 and was soon in the lead some three or four lengths. I 

 pulled her hard round the turn up the hill, and she was 

 thirty-seven seconds in going to the quarter. On the second 

 quarter, along the backstretch, she was under a strong pull 

 all the way, and did it in 36s., the half mile being trotted 

 in 1m. 13s. All this time the mare was well within herself, 

 fully collected, and pulling very hard. She had trotted a 

 second quarter in a third heat in June, when she was green, 

 it being her first race that year, in thirty-five seconds. She 

 was now well seasoned, in splendid speed and wind, and full 

 of ardor and determination. She went into the third quar- 

 ter, where there is a little descent, with such speed and reso- 

 lution that I deemed it unsafe to pull her any harder than 



