LIFE WITH THE TROTTERS. 177 



some of talent remarked that I had paid pretty well for a 

 13oor horse, and when I started him in Washington the 

 following week in a large field of pretty fair campaigners, 

 he was entirely overlooked in the betting. I thought he had 

 a chance to win, and told some of my friends so. We got 

 our money on at good odds, and when it came to the race 

 I laid Wedgewood up the first heat, winning the second with 

 him in 2:25^. I then made up my mind that everybody was 

 getting ready to have a battle, and that it was a safe con- 

 clusion that I would have a chance to lay up a heat or two, 

 which I did. Wedgewood won the sixth and seventh heats 

 of this race and convinced me that I had not overstepped 

 the mark when I bought him. That was the last race he 

 trotted that season. I sent him to Long Island to be win- 

 tered, where he was jogged and well cared for until the 

 following sj)ring. He was then allowed to serve a few mares 

 before leaving Long Island, after which I took him in hand, 

 trotted a few ^preparatory races, and went to Chicago, at 

 which place the grand circuit of that year properly began, 

 my idea being to trot him in his class all through circuit, 

 feeling confident that he would make a record and perform 

 in a manner that would justify all I claimed concerning him. 

 Wedgewood did more than this, for from Chicago to 

 Hartford, or in other words from Lake Michigan to the 

 Atlantic Ocean, he trotted and won every race for his class 

 in the grand-circuit meeting, placing a succession of victo- 

 ries to his credit that have never been equaled by any trot- 

 ting stallion, as he was successful at Chicago, Cleveland, 

 Buffalo, Rochester, Springfield, and Hartford, and to show 

 the wonderful endurance of this horse I may state that in 

 these six races, the number of heats trotted Avas twenty- 

 nine, or an average of five to a race. In the Chicago race, 

 I had only Lucy and Katie Middleton as opponents, and as 

 Wedgewood had the foot of these two he won in straight 

 heats, the time of his best mile being 2:21. It may be noted 

 that in this mile he reduced his record of the previous year 

 two and one -half seconds . At Cleveland there was a remark- 



