SHOEING COLTS. 



m6ved to harness I found lie could go au eighth in less than 0:20. 

 That was not very fast, still it showed a big Improvement over the 

 speed he liad shown in the fall. 



*'Being pleased with the colt, I was determined to do the best I 

 could with him. He only saw the track about two days in a week,' 

 the other days (he was never harnessed on Sunday) being set aside 

 for Jogging on the road for eight or ten miles in an hour. He was 

 driven without a check and always in an open bridle. Tbe days he 

 was given track-work I jogged him about three miles the wrong way 

 of the track, then turned and went the right way about two miles, 

 and started him, up from two to four times in that distance. I 

 would drive him about thirty or forty rods at speed, then jog him a 

 short distance before asking him for another burst of speed. After 

 I thought him in condition I drove him in these brushee about as 

 fast as he could go. 



"During all this time he was fed large quantities of grain and 

 all the hay and grass he would eat. About the middle of .Tuly he 

 was asked to go his first half-mile and did it handily in 1:15. Ten 

 days from that time he covered the same distance in -1:12,' About 

 August Ist be was driven a easy mile in 2:38%, the firsft one he had 

 ever gone. In this mile he was brushed four or five times, and the 

 rest of the time only moved along- at about a 3:00 gait. This mile 

 was about as fast as he was driven In his work in his two-year-old 

 form, and on August 9th be started at Keokuk, Iowa, in his fir^ 

 race. All of the other starters were three-year-olds. In the third 

 heat, over a poor half-mile track, he distanced the field in 2:31%, 

 and the next morning Axtell's name appeared in the daily papers for 

 the first time. Since that time none has appeared as often." 



