88 ROAD, TRACK, AND STABLE. 
ticularly in the device of the overdraw check), in 
training and driving, and finally in the speed and 
endurance of the trotters themselves. The gain in 
actual speed for a short distance has been much 
slighter than is commonly supposed. So long ago as 
1866, Hiram Woodruff drove Mr. Bonner’s gray 
mare Peerless (who was bred like Dexter, being in 
part Messenger and in part Star) a quarter of a mile 
at the rate of a mile in two minutes,— and this not 
to a sulky, but to a skeleton wagon, a four-wheeled 
vehicle, which is much heavier. It is doubtful if 
this rate of going will ever greatly be surpassed, 
though it is, I think, commonly believed by horse- 
men that some time or other a mile will be trotted 
in two minutes. The gain will probably be not so 
much in speed for a short distance as in the ability 
to maintain speed for a full cireuit of the track. 
Even Maud §. flagged a little on the last quarter of 
her fastest mile. 
For the past fifty years, and especially for the 
latter half of that time, much ingenuity and in- 
ventive skill have been employed to afford the trot- 
ter all the mechanical assistance that is possible. 
Tracks are made of an elliptical instead of a round 
shape, because the two comparatively long stretches 
or straight pieces thus obtained give the horse, 
particularly a big-striding one, the opportunity that 
he requires to get up his speed. Courses laid out in 
this way are found to be much faster than the old 
tracks, which were more nearly round. During the 
past two years many tracks have been constructed 
in what is called the kite shape, which resembles 
a long loop, or an oval, the sides of which have 
