LIFE WITH THE TKOTTEKS. 407' 



to be the greatest horse in the world, I can only say that 

 before starting on that journey I had every confidence that 

 the horse would do all that was asked of him. Just previous 

 to this he had been going some very good races against 

 Brown George and running mate, trotting at Troy, N". Y. , 

 on the 16th of July in 2:22, 2:20^, 2:20^, and at Provi- 

 dence, doing a mile in 2:20|. Then we went to Boston where 

 Dexter trotted the second heat over a half-mile track in 2:19, 

 that being the first time that he had gone a mile better than 

 2:20 in harness, the first time that Flora Temple's record of 

 2:19|, made in 1859, had been lowered by a horse trotting 

 in harness, and also the best time to that date over a half- 

 mile track. The Boston race took place July 30, and the 

 trial against time at Buffalo was set for August 14. The 

 conditions were that the horse was to trot to beat 2:19f . 



I remember that the day was a very fine one, the track 

 first class, and that a great crowd of people were present. 

 After giving Dexter a warming-up mile in 2:21|- I cooled 

 him out and came back in twenty minutes for the grand 

 effort. Of course I was anxious that the horse should do 

 the best work that he was capable of and at the same time 

 confident that unless some mistake was made he would trot 

 a mile in 2:18 or better. At that time the practice of drivers 

 carrying watches and timing their own miles was not in 

 vogue, we being obliged to Judge of the pace as best we could 

 and figure on how near to the limit of our horse's speed we 

 were going. My idea was to get Dexter safely around the 

 first turn, at which point as I have said he was a little apt 

 to overtrot himself, and then let him rate along about as he 

 saw fit. I knew that he was a horse of so much courage and 

 ambition that he would do pretty nearly his best without 

 any urging at all, and it was my calculation to follow this 

 programme until three-quarters of a mile had been trotted 

 and then drive him through the stretch as well as I could. 

 This plan was strictly adhered to. I knew the horse was 

 going well all the time and as we finished the mile made up 

 my mind that it had been done in 2:18 or a little better. Of 



