McDOEL. 



(Published in "'The American Sportsman," December 4, 1890.) 



There is a peculiar fascination in the history of a great 

 horse, especially one foaled in obscurity and making him- 

 self great by his own achievements, and not the reflected 

 greatness of a fashionable pedigree or renowned rela- 

 tionship. 



Somehow the subject of this sketch has frequently 

 come across my turf path when I thought he was over- 

 rated, an out-bred mongrel that was bound to "stop," and 

 as I have continually contributed to the pocket books of 

 wiser bettors, until such contributions have accumulated 

 to considerable over double the original cost of this chest- 

 nut gelding, and having seen — and lost on it as usual — 

 his last race at Lexington against Allerton, I think I 

 have paid well for my present opinion, that there are not 

 more than two horses on the American turf that can beat 

 McDoel a three-in-five race, and it is by no means cer- 

 tain that they can. 



Having gathered around the stove listening to predic- 

 tions of phantom winners for next year and reminiscences 

 of trotters whose names are almost buried in oblivion,, 

 let me tell the story of one that so often figured I, i, i, 

 in the summaries of 1890, as I heard it from W. A. Mc- 

 Nulty, of Sedalia, Mo. He picked this horse out and 

 bought him for a trotter, persistently, through all the 

 ups and downs, believed him to be a trotter, trained him 



