60 OINEY O'SHKA. 



While in Ireland, Oiney had learned that every 

 horse has his distance and that it is very rare to find 

 one that was swift on the flat and at the same time 

 clever at cross country work, but he managed to keep 

 one or two of both and at the same time make them 

 pay for their keep. The average man looks on a race 

 horse as a very useless piece of property, and he is if 

 not trained for what he is bred that is, racing. In 

 what was then known as Upper Canada, thoroughbred 

 stallions were found to be very good property, 

 as after the farmers learned that they could cross their 

 farm mares with them and get saddlers, hunters, and 

 in some cases, horses that could sprint like all pos- 

 sessed for half a mile and sometimes three-quarters, 

 they were willing to breed to them. The O'Sheas 

 knew that when they landed on this side of the At- 

 lantic, and being the first in the field they, for years, 

 gathered in many a dollar from buyers for stock that 

 could not go fast enough to race and at the same time 

 managed to sweep the boards at the county fairs with 

 those that could. You will not find the breeding of 

 any of their stock in the Stud Book, for while they at 

 different times had both thoroughbred stallions and 

 mares and raised colts from them, they never went to 

 the trouble of having them recorded. In the O'Shea 

 family the stamp of excellence in a horse rested on his 

 racing qualities. That was the beginning and the end 

 of it. Oiney took charge of those that would race, 

 while those that did not come up to expectations were 

 turned to the plough or hay wagon until a buyer put in 

 an appearance. 



I became acquainted with Oiney O'Shea in a very 

 peculiar manner. One afternoon in the early seven- 



