Harry Bassett and Longfellow 341 



had won fourteen races without losing a heat 

 or race. 



Long Branch was the next point. Both Harry 

 Bassett and Longfellow were engaged in the 

 Monmouth Cup, a dash of two miles and a half. 

 It was placed on the programme of July 2. An 

 immense concourse of people assembled to wit- 

 ness the trial of the issues joined between the 

 rival celebrities for first honors, and a more 

 thoroughly disappointed assemblage has rarely 

 gathered on an American race-course. Longfel- 

 low won with such ease as to throw suspicion 

 upon the fairness of the contest, and the criticisms 

 of the press, though evidently without the facts to 

 justify them, were severe beyond measure. Harry 

 Bassett was found to be out of condition, and 

 Colonel Mc Daniel took him promptly in hand 

 for the Saratoga meeting, where he was again 

 engaged to meet the great Kentuckian. 



Uncle John Harper brought Longfellow to the 

 North primarily to win the Monmouth Cup, and 

 secondarily to beat Harry Bassett. Both those 

 things Longfellow did in such a way that the 

 Eastern world acclaimed him. After Monmouth 

 came the meeting at Saratoga, It was in the 

 middle of July of the year 1872. Above every 



