LIFE WITT! THE TKOTTERS. H 



now the custom. It was the old-fashioned idea that a horse 

 must be reduced in liesh, and they were " drawn" more like 

 race-horses than at present. For instance, no one thought 

 of giving a horse water the night before his race. He would 

 get a small feed of hay and oats, and then the muzzle was 

 put on. On the morning of his race the feed would be re- 

 duced still more, Avith very little water, and as a rule the 

 horse was given a good deal of work on that morning. 

 While his race was being trotted he got very little water be- 

 tween heats. They clothed the trotters in those days mncli 

 more than at present, and the rubbing and grooming was 

 something terrible, both to man and horse. There Avere 

 generally two men to every horse, or rather a man and a 

 boy, the latter being called a helper; and as a rule both 

 were kept busy from morning till night working around 

 the horse. I have seen horses made so sore by this 

 treatment that they would hardly let you put a hand 

 on them, and there is no doubt in my mind that in many 

 instances animals were made vicions, and their otherwise 

 good tempers and dispositions ruined by this con- 

 stant friction by rubbing, and working with currycombs, 

 etc. 



At the end of this season I made the acquaintance of Mr. 

 J. C. Kelly, a resident of Illinois. In the words of Horace 

 Greeley, he advised me to go west, and the result was that 

 I entered into a contract with him and went to Jacksonville, 

 111. , where he had a race-track, a livery stable, and a farm. 

 My duties were to help him train and drive and make 

 myself generally useful. I soon found that in Kelly I had 

 struck a real wide-awake, all-round horse jockey. He bought 

 and sold a great many horses for the carriage, the road, 

 and for draught pur^DOses. He could pick out a horse that 

 was liable to step along some as quick as any man 1 ever 

 saw, and after he had selected him could make the animal 

 show what he was cajDable of. In him I found a man who 

 seemed glad to give me all the points that would be of use to 

 me. I saw Kelly diive a good many races for a great deal 



