122 HANDBOOK OP THE TURF. 



In 1669, Governor Lovelace, who succeeded Governor Xichols, 

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

 time for nearly a hundred years, history is quite silent on the 

 subject of horse racing. Then it revived, and one historian 

 says "there was no end 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." As wealth and 

 leisure increased in the country, after the close of the Revolu- 

 tionary war, the sport of racing grew so rapidly that laws for 

 its suppression were passed. Pennsylvania passed such laws 

 in 1794, 1817 and 1820; New Jersey in 1797, followed by the 

 States of New York, Connecticut, and probably all the other 

 New England States. The first recorded trotting j^erformance 

 in this country was by the horse Yankee, at Harlem, K. Y., 

 July 6, 1806, over a track said to have been short of a mile, in 

 2:59. At Philadelphia, in 1810, the Boston horse trotted a 

 mile to harness in 2:48^. The earliest organized effort in 

 behalf of trotting in this country was started at Philadelphia 

 in 1828, by the establishment of the Hunting Park Associa- 

 tion. See, Sport of Kings, Queens of the Turf, Trotting 

 Families, Extreme Speed, and celebrated individual horses. 



Hitcli. To hobble ; an unsteady gait which crosses and 

 jerks. 



Hitch. A team ; a horse or horses harnessed to a buggy 

 is said to be a "hitch," and if fine, is properly called a nice 

 hitch ; a good hitch. 



Hock. The hock is placed between the gaskin and the 

 hind cannon bone, from which it may be separated by a line 

 drawn across this bone at the point at which its head begins to 

 enlarge in order to form a joint with the lower bones of the 

 hock. The hock in the horse represents the heel in man, and 

 the elongations of bones and corresponding tendons are neces- 

 sary modifications of the plan for the development of speed. 



The lioek joint is unique in construction. The interlocking giooves of 

 this joint are not direct, us In otlier hinge joints of the body, and 

 as the corresponding joint in man is, but oblique, so tliat when 

 flexion takes jilace at that joint, tlie lower ray is carried obliquely 

 outward, and when tlie other leg is passed, and the extension takes 

 place again, its action is reversed and tlie foot is returned to the 

 pt)sition required to support the center of gravity. By this simple 

 contrivance the danger of accident isplaced beyond tiie will of tlie 

 animal, and in well formed horses beyond the possibility of acci- 

 dent. Some horses circumduct the h'ind feet more than others, 

 and in otliers the stifle action is most marked; but it is not com- 

 mon to see both excessive in the same horse. There is often con- 

 siderable difference in different horses in the length of the hock. 

 The long hock gives the greatest power, for the reason that the 

 leverage is greater; but what is gained in power is lost in speed. 

 —The Horse in Motion, J. D. B. Stillman. 



Hock, Point of. The bony projection at the back and 



