194 OLD-TIME TROTTERS. 



As before stated, Ripton was a horse able to stand, and, in 

 fact, requiring a great amount of work in his preparations for 

 a race, and with the same amount of work that trainers of 

 other horses of less spirit and stamina would dare to give them, 

 he would be practicably unmanageable in a hotly-contested 

 race. "When at his best he was considered the fastest little 

 horse on the American Trotting turf. He was a very horsey 

 little horse, a product of the Green Mountain State, and a fair 

 representative of the old-time Morgans. 



In recapitulating the performances of Kip ton in 1842,, by 

 Hiram Woodruff, we find that he trotted in that year as fol- 

 lows: First, two-mile heats in harness, which he won in two 

 heats, beating Lady Suffolk and Confidence ; second, two-mile 

 heats in harness, which he won in three heats, beating Lady 

 Suffolk ; third, two-mile heats in harness, which he won in two 

 heats, beating Lady Suffolk and "Washington ; fourth, two-mile 

 heats in harness, which he won, beating Confidence ; fifth, two- 

 mile heats to wagons weighing 187 pounds, which Confidence 

 won in three heats ; sixth, three-mile heats in harness with Con- 

 fidence and Lady Suffolk, which he won ; seventh, mile heats 

 to wagons with Americus, which Americus won in two heats ; 

 eighth, three-mile heats in harness with Americus, which Kip- 

 ton won in three straight heats. Ripton trotted fourteen two- 

 mile races and five three-mile races that season, and of these he 

 won thirteen. 



Hiram "Woodruff said that Ripton, of all the horses he ever 

 had, was one of those that required the most work. " He was 

 so resolute and game, and his spirits were so high, that if not 

 kept down by a good deal of steady work he was almost cer- 

 tain to run away as soon as he was suffered to go fast ; with the 

 work that most horses required he would be almost or quite 

 unmanageable." 



Yet there was no vice about him, but the exuberance of his 

 spirit was such that when he was at all indulged he would run 

 away from mere fun. 



