344 TRAINING THE TROTTING HORSE. 



century. The first running races of wliicli we have any trace in 

 history were established by Governor Nicholls, and were held on 

 Hempstead Heath, Long Island. In 1665, he established a race-course 

 here, and ordered that a plate should be run for every year. (Be it 

 remembered that there were no thoroughbreds in those days; Fear- 

 naught and Jolly Eoger, the best of the early importations of English 

 thoroughbreds, did not see ximerica for nearly or quite a hundred 

 years after this, and they were among the first to come.) We find 

 that, in 1669, Governor Lovelace, who succeeded Governor Nicholls, 

 ordered races to be run on Hempstead Heath, but from that year to 

 1736 history, as to racing here, is silent. After this, racing at proba- 

 bly all gaits flourished until it seems to have become an evil. " There 

 was no end," says one historian, "to scrub and pace-racing in all 

 parts of the middle and southern colonies, and particularly on the 

 good and shaded roads of Manhattan Island." In 1774, the Conti- 

 nental Congress, by resolution, practically forbid horse-racing; and, 

 in 1748, the Legislature of New Jersey enacted a law restraining all 

 "running, pacing and trotting-races. " 



The first recorded trotting performance in America was that of 

 Yankee, at Harlem, New York, July 6, 1806. The time of the mile was 

 2:50, but the track was not a full mile. At Philadelphia, August, 

 1810, a " Boston horse" trotted the mile to harness in 2:48i, but the 

 next best performance I find is in 1818, and then the time is only 

 3:00. To estimate the progress in speed made by the trotter in con- 

 sequence of his being bred for his special purpose we must approxi- 

 mate his extreme speed at the beginning of the founding of the 

 breed. If we take for granted that Yankee could trot in 3:00 in 

 1806, in contrast with the 2:08f of Maud S. in 1885, we have a dif- 

 ference of O-.oli in seventy-nine years. But it would be erroneous to 

 conclude that the extreme speed capacity of the trotter of to-day is 

 0:50 to the mile over that of the trotter of eighty years ago. 

 Improved tracks, appliances and methods have accomplished much. 

 If we could approximate just how much of the improvement in speed 

 is due to the improved tracks, appliances and methods, we could then 

 give to improved blood its share of credit. Guarding, then, against 

 the error of giving all the honor to superiority of blood, let us 

 note, step by step, the improvement in the extreme speed of the 

 trotter. 



From the performances above noted I think it fair to approximate 

 the extreme speed of the trotter previous to 1820, at 2:50 to the mile. 



