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                           TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY

 ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
 VOL 1.              NASHVILLE, TENN., MARCH, 1906.                NO. 6
 ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────




                                Contents


[Illustration]

        MAJOR J. W. THOMAS                         Frontispiece

        HOW THE BISHOP FROZE                John Trotwood Moore

        EARLY APPLES—A SOUTHERN OPPORTUNITY        R. A. Wilkes

        THE ARMY HORSE                             O. M. Norton

        THE HISTORY OF THE HALS             John Trotwood Moore

        MAMMY AND MEMORY                                   Poem

        NITRIFICATION OF THE SOIL                  Wm. Dennison

        THE GREAT NEW SOUTH

        BRE’R WASHINGTON’S CONSOLATION                 Old Wash

        CONCERNING LITTLENESS               John Trotwood Moore

        OLE COTTON TAIL                                Old Wash

        STORIES OF THE SOIL

        HISTORIC HIGHWAYS OF THE SOUTH      John Trotwood Moore

        A FAMOUS HORSE RACE                          B. M. Hord

        WITH OUR WRITERS

        WITH TROTWOOD—Personal Department

        BUSINESS DEPARTMENT


 Copyright 1906 by Trotwood Publishing Co. All rights reserved. Entered
 as second-class matter Sept. 8, 1905, at the Postoffice at Nashville,
           Tenn., under the Act of Congress of March 8, 1879.




                          Major John W. Thomas


Just as the forms are closing for the March edition of TROTWOOD’S
MONTHLY comes news of the death of Major John Wilson Thomas, who was
born in Nashville, Tennessee, on August 24, 1830, and died in Nashville,
February 12, 1906.

At the age of 28 he entered railroad work, and was in harness
continually up to the time of his death, being at that time President of
the Nashville, Chattanooga & St. Louis Railroad.

We regret that limited time and space will not permit us to give a
detailed account of the many incidents that made up the life of this
great and good man, but we are safe in saying that a more popular man
never lived in the South—or elsewhere. The “Old Man,” as he was
affectionately called by his employes, was ever ready to listen with a
sympathetic ear to the story of the unfortunate, and encouragement was
always freely given. Every employe under him was supposed to do his very
best. He demanded everything there was in a man, and got it; not from
fear, but through the love they had for him. His word was law and his
decision final, for right and justice always prevailed. No man was ever
loved and respected more by his employes than Major Thomas, and his
record as a railroad man was seldom if ever equaled. He did not grow up
with the road, but it grew up with him, and he made it what it is
to-day.

Somebody will take his place as president of the N., C. & St. L. road,
but there is no one to take his place in the hearts of his friends. He
was a great and good man.


                         THE MOURNING TENNESSEE

                        BY WILL ALLEN DROMGOOLK.

  [The little engine, “Tennessee,” that always drew the private car of
      President Thomas stands draped in mourning for thirty days.]

            Do you know, as you stand there waiting,
              Rigged out in your trappings of woe,
            That someone lies dead, up yonder?
              Do you know, Tennessee, do you know?

            Do you know why that grim, black banner
              Trails over each shining place?
            Do you understand, I wonder,
              The stain on your fireman’s face?

            Do you know, as you stand there waiting,
              You dear little thing, Tennessee,
            That the cab and the coach are empty?
              Lonesome as they can be?

            That the face that shone out from the window,
              Flashing your welcome back,
            No more will brighten the darkness
              Of the desolate, lonely track.

            Does it hurt you to know that his footstep
              Will linger no more at the door?
            Does it hurt you to know that his presence
              Will gladden the way no more.

            He is dead! Can you understand it?
              Under your brass and steel,
            Because that his great heart loved you,
              I am sure you must know and feel.

            Yet, your whistle would shriek its anguish,
              I am sure, if you understood,
            And your bell would toll if I touched it;
              You would voice your grief if you could.

            You must know, as you stand there waiting,
              Rigged out in your misery,
            He would come if he could, for he loved you,
              You poor little friend, Tennessee.

            Dumb things have a speech of their own, though,
              And I’m sure you are trying to tell
            Of those long, good flights together,
              For I know that he loved you well.

            Just a month you must wear your trappings,
              Your lustreless emblems of woe;
            But I’m sure you will miss him forever
              Deep down in the heart, you know.

            I toss you a sigh, and a heartbreak,
              And I give you this truth, in a tear;
            The sting of death isn’t dying,
              But memory, do you hear?




                          How the Bishop Froze

                        BY JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE.

[Through the kindness of John C. Winston & Co., publishers, of
Philadelphia, Pa., we are permitted to give to our readers this treat,
being one of the chapters from the forthcoming novel of John Trotwood
Moore, entitled “The Bishop of Cottontown,” now in the Winston press,
and which will be issued by them early in March. This novel has been
pronounced truly great by many publishers’ readers. It deals with child
labor in the Southern cotton mills and the Bishop is the kindly old
preacher and ex-trainer of ante-bellum thoroughbreds, who is the hero of
the book.—E. E. Sweetland, Business Manager.]


It was ten o’clock and the Bishop was on his way to church. He was
driving the old roan of the night before. A parody on a horse, to one
who did not look closely, but to one who knows and looks beyond the mere
external form for that hidden something in both man and horse which
bespeaks strength and reserve force, there was seen through the
blindness and the ugliness and the sleepy, ambling, shuffling gait a
clean-cut form, with deep chest and closely ribbed; with well drawn
flanks, a fine, flat steel-turned bone, and a powerful muscle, above
hock and forearms, that clung to the leg as the Bishop said, “like bees
aswarmin’.”

At his little cottage gate stood Bud Billings, the best slubber in the
cotton mill. Bud never talked to any one except the Bishop, and his
wife, who was the worst Xantippe in Cottontown, declared she had lived
with him six months straight and never heard him come nearer speaking
than a grunt. It was also a saying of Richard Travis that Bud had been
known to break all records for silence by drawing a year’s wages at the
mill, never missing a minute and never speaking a word.

Nor had he ever looked any one full in the eye in his life.

As the Bishop drove shamblingly along down the road, deeply preoccupied
in his forthcoming sermon, there came from out of a hole, situated
somewhere between the grizzled fringe of hair that marked Bud’s whiskers
and the grizzled fringe above that marked his eye-brows, a piping,
apologetic voice that sounded like the first few rasps of an old rusty
saw; but to the occupant of the buggy it meant, with a drawl:

“Howdy do, Bishop?”

A blind horse is quick to observe and take fright at anything uncanny.
He is the natural ghost-finder of the highways, and that voice was too
much for the old roan. To him it sounded like something that had been
resurrected. It was a ghost-voice, arising after many years. He shied,
sprang forward, half wheeled and nearly upset the buggy, until brought
up with a jerk by the powerful arms of his driver. The shaft-band had
broken and the buggy had run upon the horse’s rump, and the shafts stuck
up almost at right angles over his back. The roan stood trembling with
the half turned, inquisitive muzzle of the sightless horse—a paralysis
of fear all over his face. But when Bud came forward and touched his
face and stroked it, the fear vanished, and the old roan bobbed his tail
up and down and wiggled his head reassuringly and apologetically.

“Wal, I declar, Bishop,” grinned Bud, “kin yo’ critter fetch a caper?”

The Bishop got leisurely out of his buggy, pulled down the shafts and
tied up the girth before he spoke. Then he gave a puckering hitch to his
underlip and deposited in the sand, with a puddling plunk, the half cup
of tobacco juice that had closed his mouth.

He stepped back and said very sternly:

“Whoa, Ben Butler!”

“Why, he’un’s sleep a’ready,” grinned Bud.

The Bishop glanced at the bowed head, cocked hind foot and listless
tail: “Sof’nin’ of the brain, Bud,” smiled the Bishop; “they say when
old folks begin to take it they jus’ go to sleep while settin’ up
talkin’. Now, a horse, Bud,” he said, striking an attitude for a
discussion on his favorite topic, “a horse is like a man—he must have
some meanness or he c’u’dn’t live, an’ some goodness or nobody else
c’u’d live. But git in, Bud, and let’s go along to meetin’—’pears like
it’s gettin’ late.”

This was what Bud had been listening for. This was the treat of the
week for him—to ride to meetin’ with the Bishop. Bud, a
slubber-slave—henpecked at home, browbeaten and cowed at the mill,
timid, scared, “an’ powerful slow-mouthed,” as his spouse termed it,
worshipped the old Bishop and had no greater pleasure in life, after
his hard week’s work, than “to ride to meetin’ with the old man an’
jes’ hear him narrate.”

The Bishop’s great, sympathetic soul went out to the poor fellow, and
though he had rather spend the next two miles of Ben Butler’s slow
journey to church in thinking over his sermon, he never failed, as he
termed it, “to pick up charity even on the road-side,” and it was pretty
to see how the old man would turn loose his crude histrionic talent to
amuse the slubber. He knew, too, that Bud was foolish about horses, and
that Ben Butler was his model!

They got into the old buggy, and Ben Butler began to draw it slowly
along the sandy road to the little church, two miles away up the
mountain side.

Bud was now in the seventh heaven. He was riding behind Ben Butler, the
greatest horse in the world, and talking to the Bishop, the only person
who ever heard the sound of his voice, save in deprecatory and scary
grunts.

It was touching to see how the old man humored the simple and
imposed-upon creature at his side. It was beautiful to see how,
forgetting himself and his sermon, he prepared to entertain, in his
quaint way, this slave to the slubbing machine.

Bud looked fondly at the Bishop—then admiringly at Ben Butler. He drew a
long breath of pure air, and sitting on the edge of the seat, prepared
to jump if necessary, for Bud was mortally afraid of being in a runaway,
and his scared eyes seemed to be looking for the soft places in the
road.

“Bishop,” he drawled after a while, “huc-cum you name sech a
hoss”—pointing to the old roan—“sech a grand hoss, for sech a man—sech a
man as he was,” he added humbly.

“Did you ever notice Ben Butler’s eyes, Bud?” asked the old man
knowingly.

“Blind,” said Bud sadly, shaking his head—“too bad—too bad—great—great
hoss!”

“Yes, but the leds, Bud—that hoss, Ben Butler there, holds a world’s
record—he’s the only cock-eyed hoss in the world.”

“You don’t say so—that critter!—cock-eyed?” Bud laughed and slapped
his leg gleefully. “Didn’t I always tell you so? World’s
record—great—great!”

Then it broke gradually through on Bud’s dull mind.

He slapped his leg again. “An’ him—his namesake—he was cock-eyed, too—I
seed him onct at New ’Leens.”

“Don’t you never trust a cock-eyed man, Bud. He’ll flicker on you in the
home-stretch. I’ve tried it an’ it never fails. Love him, but don’t
trust him. The world is full of folks we oughter love, but not trust.”

“No—I never will,” said Bud as thoughtfully as he knew how to be—“nor a
cock-eyed ’oman neither. My wife’s cock-eyed,” he added.

He was silent a moment. Then he showed the old man a scar on his
forehead: “She done that last month—busted a plate on my head.”

“That’s bad,” said the Bishop consolingly—“but you ortenter aggravate
her, Bud.”

“That’s so—I ortenter—least-wise, not whilst there’s any crockery in the
house,” said Bud sadly.

“There’s another thing about this hoss,” went on the Bishop—“he’s always
spoony on mules. He ain’t happy if he can’t hang over the front gate
spoonin’ with every stray mule that comes along. There’s old long-eared
Lize that he’s dead stuck on—if he c’u’d write he’d be composin’ a
sonnet to her ears, like poets do to their lady love’s—callin’ them Star
Pointers of a Greater Hope, I reck’n, an’ all that. Why, he’d ruther
hold hands by moonlight with some old Maria mule than to set up by
lamplight with a thoroughbred filly.”

“Great—great!” said Bud slapping his leg—“didn’t I tell you so?”

“So I named him Ben Butler when he was born. That was right after the
war, an’ I hated old Ben so an’ loved hosses so, I thought ef I’d name
my colt for old Ben maybe I’d learn to love him, in time.”

Bud shook his head. “That’s ag’in nature, Bishop.”

“But I have, Bud—sho’ as you are born I love old Ben Butler.” He lowered
his voice to an earnest whisper: “I ain’t never told you what he done
for po’ Cap’n Tom.”

“Never heurd o’ Cap’n Tom.”

The Bishop looked hurt. “Never mind, Bud, you wouldn’t understand. But
maybe you will ketch this. Listen now.”

Bud listened intently with his head on one side.

“I ain’t never hated a man in my life but what God has let me live long
enough to find out I was in the wrong—dead wrong. There are Jews and
Yankees. I useter hate ’em worse’n sin—but now what do you reckon?”

“One on ’em busted a plate on yo’ head?” asked Bud.

“Jesus Christ was a Jew, an’ Cap’n Tom jined the Yankees.”

“Bud,” he said cheerily after a pause, “did I ever tell you the story of
this here Ben Butler here?”

Bud’s eyes grew bright and he slapped his leg again.

“Well,” said the old man, brightening up into one of his funny moods,
“you know my first wife was named Kathleen—Kathleen Galloway when she
was a gal, an’ she was the pretties’ gal in the settlement an’ could go
all the gaits both saddle an’ harness. She was han’som’ as a
three-year-old an’ cu’d out-dance, out-ride, out-sing an’ out-flirt any
other gal that ever come down the pike. When she got her Sunday harness
on an’ began to move, she made all the other gals look like they were
nailed to the road-side. It’s true, she needed a little weight in front
to balance her, an’ she had a lot of ginger in her make-up, but she was
straight and sound, didn’t wear anything but the harness an’ never
teched herself anywhere nor cross-fired nor hit her knees.”

“Good—great!” said Bud, slapping his leg.

“Oh, she was beautiful, Bud, with that silky hair that ’ud make a
thoroughbred filly’s look coarse as sheep’s wool, an’ two
mischief-lovin’ eyes an’ a heart that was all gold. Bud—Bud”—and there
was a huskiness in the old man’s voice—“I know I can tell you because it
will never come back to me ag’in, but I love that Kathleen now as I did
then. A man may marry many times, but he can never love but once.
Sometimes it’s his fust wife, sometimes his secon’, an’ often it’s the
sweetheart he never got—but he loved only one of ’em the right way, an’
up yander, in some other star, where spirits that are alike meet in one
eternal wedlock, they’ll be one there forever.

“Her daddy, ole man Galloway, had a thoroughbred filly that he named
Kathleena for his daughter, an’ she c’u’d do anything that the gal left
out. An’ one day when she took the bit in her teeth an’ run a quarter in
twenty-five seconds, she sot ’em all wild an’ lots of fellers tried to
buy the filly an’ get the old man to throw in the gal for her keep an’
board.

“I was one of ’em. I was clerkin’ for the old man an’ boardin’ in the
house, an’ whenever a young feller begins to board in a house where
there is a thoroughbred gal, the nex’ thing he knows he’ll be—”

“Buckled in the traces,” cried Bud slapping his leg gleefully, at this,
his first product of brilliancy.

The old man smiled: “’Pon my word, Bud, you’re gittin’ so smart. I don’t
know what I’ll be doin’ with you—so ’riginal an’ smart. Why, you’ll quit
keepin’ an old man’s company—like me. I won’t be able to entertain you
at all. But, as I was sayin’ the next thing he knows, he’ll be one of
the family.

“So me an’ Kathleen, we soon got spoony an’ wanted to marry. Lots of ’em
wanted to marry her, but I drawed the pole an’ was the only one she’d
take as a runnin’ mate. So I went after the old man this a way: I told
him I’d buy the filly if he’d give me Kathleen. I never will forgit what
he said: ‘They ain’t narry one of ’em for sale, swap or hire, an’ I wish
you young fellers ’ud tend to yo’ own business an’ let my fillies alone.
I’m gwinter bus’ the wurl’s record wid ’em both—Kathleena the runnin’
record an Kathleen the gal record, so be damn to you an’ don’t pester me
no mo’.’”

“Did he say damn?” asked Bud aghast—that such a word should ever come
from the Bishop.

“He sho’ did, Bud. I wouldn’t lie about the old man, now that he’s dead.
It ain’t right to lie about dead people—even to make ’em say nice an’
proper things they never thought of whilst alive. If we’d stop lyin’
about the ungodly dead an’ tell the truth about ’em, maybe the livin’
’u’d stop tryin’ to foller after ’em in that respect. As it is, every
one of ’em knows that no matter how wicked he lives there’ll be a lot o’
nice lies told over him after he’s gone, an’ a monument erected, maybe,
to tell how good he was. An’ there’s another lot of half pious folks in
the wurl it ’u’d help—kind o’ sissy pious folks—that jus’ do manage to
miss all the fun in this world an’ jus’ are mean enough to ketch hell in
the nex’. Get religion, but don’t get the sissy kind. So I am for
tellin’ it about old man Galloway jus’ as he was.

“You orter heard him swear. Bud—it was part of his religion. An’
wherever he is to-day in that other world, he is at it yet, for in that
other life, Bud, we’re just ourselves on a bigger scale than we are in
this. He used to cuss the clerks around the store jus’ from habit, an’
when I went to work for him he said:

“‘Young man, maybe I’ll cuss you out some mornin’, but don’t pay no
’tention to it—it’s just a habit I’ve got into, an’ the boys all
understand it.’

“‘Glad you told me,’ I said, lookin’ him square in the eye—‘one
confidence deserves another. I’ve got a nasty habit of my own, but I
hope you won’t pay no ’tention to it, for it’s a habit, an’ I can’t help
it. I don’t mean nothin’ by it, an’ the boys all understand it, but when
a man cusses me I allers knock him down—do it befo’ I think’—I
said—‘jes’ a habit I’ve got.’

“Well, he never cussed me all the time I was there. My stock went up
with the old man an’ my chances was good to get the gal, if I hadn’t
made a fool hoss-trade; for with old man Galloway a good hoss-trade
covered all the multitude of sins in a man that charity now does in
religion. In them days a man might have all the learnin’ and virtues an’
graces, but if he c’u’dn’t trade hosses he was tinklin’ brass an’
soundin’ cymbal in that community.

“The man that throwed the silk into me was Jud Carpenter—the same fellow
that’s now the whipper-in for these mills. Now, don’t be scared,” said
the old man soothingly as Bud’s scary eyes looked about him and he
clutched the buggy as if he would jump out—“he’ll not pester you
now—he’s kept away from me ever since. He swapped me a black hoss with a
star an’ snip that looked like the genuine thing, but was about the
neatest turned gold-brick that was ever put on an unsuspectin’
millionaire.

“Well, in the trade he simply robbed me of a fine mare I had, that cost
me one-an’-a-quarter. Kathleen an’ me was already engaged, but when old
man Galloway heard of it, he told me the jig was up an’ no such
double-barrel idiot as I was sh’u’d ever leave any of my colts in the
Galloway paddock—that when he looked over his gran’-chillun’s pedigree
he didn’t wanter see all of ’em crossin’ back to the same damned fool!
Oh, he was nasty. He said that my colts was dead sho’ to be luffers with
wheels in their heads, an’ when pinched they’d quit, an’ when collared
they’d lay down. That there was a yaller streak in me that was already
pilin’ up coupons on the future for tears and heartaches an’ maybe a
gallows or two, an’ a lot of uncomplimentary talk of that kind.

“Well, Kathleen cried, an’ I wept, an’ I’ll never forgit the night she
gave me a little good-bye kiss out under the big oak tree an’ told me
we’d hafter part.

“The old man maybe sized me up all right as bein’ a fool, but he missed
it on my bein’ a quitter. I had no notion of being fired an’ blistered
an’ turned out to grass that early in the game. I wrote her a poem every
other day, an’ lied between heats, till the po’ gal was nearly crazy,
an’ when I finally got it into her head that if it was a busted blood
vessel with the old man, it was a busted heart with me, she cried a
little mo’ an’ consented to run off with me an’ take the chances of the
village doctor cuppin’ the old man at the right time.

“The old lady was on my side and helped things along. I had everything
fixed even to the moon, which was shinin’ jes’ bright enough to carry us
to the Justice’s without a lantern, some three miles away, an’ into the
nex’ county.

“I’ll never fergit how the night looked as I rode over after her, how
the wildflowers smelt, an’ the fresh dew on the leaves. I remember that
I even heard a mockin’-bird wake up about midnight as I tied my hoss to
a lim’ in the orchard nearby, an’ slipped aroun’ to meet Kathleen at the
bars behin’ the house. It was a half mile to the house an’ I was
slippin’ through the sugar-maple trees along the path we’d both walked
so often befo’, when I saw what I thought was Kathleen comin’ towards
me. I ran to meet her. It wa’n’t Kathleen, but her mother—an’ she told
me to git in a hurry, that the old man knew all, had locked Kathleen up
in the kitchen, turned the brindle dog loose in the yard, an’ was hidin’
in the woods nigh the barn, with his gun loaded with bird-shot, an’ that
if I went any further the chances were I’d not sit down agin for a year.
She had slipped around through the woods just to warn me.

“Of course I wanted to fight an’ take her anyway—kill the dog an’ the
old man, storm the kitchen an’ run off with Kathleen in my arms as they
do in novels. But the old lady said she didn’t want the dog hurt—it
being a valuable coon-dog—and that I was to go away out of the county
an’ wait for a better time.

“It mighty nigh broke me up, but I decided the old lady was right an’
I’d go away. But ’long towards the shank of the night, after I had put
up my hoss, the moon was still shinin’, an’ I c’u’dn’t sleep for
thinkin’ of Kathleen. I stole afoot over to her house just to look at
her window. The house was all quiet an’ even the brindle dog was asleep.
I threw kisses at her bed-room window, but even then I c’u’dn’t go away,
so I slipped around to the barn and laid down in the hay to think over
my hard luck. My heart ached an’ burned an’ I was nigh dead with love.

“I wondered if I’d ever get her, if they’d wean her from me, an’ give
her to the rich little feller whose fine farm j’ined the old man’s an’
who the old man was wuckin’ fur—whether the two wouldn’t over-persuade
her whilst I was gone. For I’d made up my mind I’d go befo’
daylight—that there wasn’t anything else for me to do.

“I was layin’ in the hay, an’ boylike, the tears was rollin’ down. If I
c’u’d only kiss her han’ befo’ I left—if I c’u’d only see her face at
the winder!

“I must have sobbed out loud, for jus’ then I heard a gentle,
sympathetic whinny an’ a cold, inquisitive little muzzle was thrust into
my face, as I lay on my back with my heart nearly busted. It was
Kathleena, an’ I rubbed my hot face against her cool cheek—for it seemed
so human of her to come an’ try to console me, an’ I put my arms around
her neck an’ kissed her silky mane an’ imagined it was Kathleen’s hair.

“Oh, I was heart-broke an’ silly.

“Then all at onct a thought came to me, an’ I slipped the bridle an’
saddle on her an’ led her out at the back door, an’ I scratched this on
a slip of paper an’ stuck it on the barn do’:

                         “‘To old man Galloway:

  “‘You wouldn’t let me ’lope with yo’ dorter, so I’ve ’loped with yo’
  filly, an’ you’ll never see hair nor hide of her till you send me
  word to come back to this house an’ fetch a preacher.’

  (Signed) “‘HILLIARD WATTS.’”

The old man smiled, and Bud slapped his leg gleefully.

“Great—great! Oh, my, but who’d a thought of it?” he grunted.

“They say it ’u’d done you good to have been there the nex’ mornin’ an’
heurd the cussin’ recurd busted—but me an’ the filly was forty miles
away. He got out a warrant for me for hoss-stealin’, but the sheriff was
fur me, an’ though he hunted high an’ low he never could find me.”

“Well, it went on for a month, an’ I got the old man’s note, sent by the
sheriff:

                 “‘To Hilliard Watts, Wher-Ever Found.

  “‘Come on home an’ fetch yo’ preacher. Can’t afford to lose the
  filly, an’ the gal has been off her feed ever since you left.

                                                    “‘JOBE GALLOWAY.’”

“Oh, Bud, I’ll never forgit that homecomin’ when she met me at the gate
an’ kissed me an’ laughed a little an’ cried a heap, an’ we walked in
the little parlor an’ the preacher made us one.

“Nor of that happy, happy year, when all life seemed a sweet dream now
as I look back, an’ even the memory of it keeps me happy. Memory is a
land that never changes in a world of changes, an’ that should show us
our soul is immortal, for memory is only the reflection of our soul.”

His voice grew more tender, and low: “Toward the last of the year I seed
her makin’ little things slyly an’ hidin’ ’em away in the bureau drawer,
an’ one night she put away a tiny half-finished little dress with the
needle stickin’ in the hem—just as she left it—just as her beautiful
hands made the last stitch they ever made on earth....

“Oh, Bud, Bud, out of this blow come the sweetest thought I ever had,
an’ I know from that day that this life ain’t all, that we’ll live agin
as sho’ as God lives an’ is just—an’ no man can doubt that. No—no—Bud,
this life ain’t all, because it’s God’s unvarying law to finish things.
That tree there is finished, an’ them birds, they are finished, an’ that
flower by the road-side an’ the mountain yonder an’ the world an’ the
stars an’ the sun. An’ we’re mo’ than they be, Bud—even the tiniest
soul, like Kathleen’s little one that jes’ opened its eyes an’ smiled
an’ died, when its mammy died. It had something that the trees an’ birds
an’ mountains didn’t have—a soul—an’ don’t you kno’ He’ll finish all
such lives up yonder? He’ll pay it back a thousandfold for what He cuts
off here.”

Bud wept because the tears were running down the old man’s cheeks. He
wanted to say something, but he could not speak. That queer feeling that
came over him at times and made him silent had come again.

The Bishop laughed outright as his mind went back again.

“Well,” he went on reminiscently, “I’ll have to finish my tale an’ tell
you how I throwed the cold steel into Jud Carpenter when I got back. I
saw I had it to do, to work back into my daddy-in-law’s graces an’ save
my reputation.

“Now, Jud had lied to me an’ swindled me terribly, when he put off that
old no-count hoss on me. Of course, I might have sued him, for a lie is
a microbe which naturally develops into a lawyer’s fee. But while it’s a
terrible braggart, it’s really cowardly an’ delicate, an’ will die of
lock-jaw if you only pick its thumb.

“So I breshed up that old black to split-silk fineness, an’ turned him
over to Dr. Sykes, a friend of mine living in the next village. An’ I
said to the Doctor, ‘Now remember he is yo’ hoss until Jud Carpenter
comes an’ offers you two hundred dollars for him.’

“‘Will he be fool enough to do it?’ he asked, as he looked the old
counterfeit over.

“‘Wait and see,’ I said.

“I said nothin’, laid low an’ froze an’ it wa’n’t long befo’ Jud come
’round as I ’lowed he’d do. He expected me to kick an’ howl; but as I
took it all so nice he didn’t understand it. Nine times out of ten the
best thing to do when the other feller has robbed you is to freeze. The
hunter on the plain knows the value of that, an’ that he can freeze an’
make a deer walk right up to him, to find out what he is. Why, a rabbit
will do it, if you jump him quick, an’ he gets confused an’ don’t know
jes’ what’s up; an’ so Jud come as I thort he’d do. He couldn’t stan’ it
no longer, an’ he wanted to rub it in. He brought his crowd to enjoy the
fun.

“‘Oh, Mr. Watts,’ he said grinnin’, ‘how do you like a coal black
stump-sucker?’

“‘Well,’ I said, indifferent enough—‘I’ve knowed good judges of hosses
to make a hones’ mistake now an’ then, an’ sell a hoss to a customer
with the heaves thinkin’ he’s a stump-sucker. But it ’u’d turn out to be
only the heaves an’ easily cured.’

“‘Is that so?’ said Jud, changing his tone.

“‘Yes,’ I said, ‘an’ I’ve knowed better judges of hosses to sell a
nervous hoss for a balker that had been balked only onct by a rattle
head. But in keerful hands I’ve seed him git over it,’ I said,
indifferent like.

“‘Indeed?’ said Jud.

“‘Yes, Jud,’ said I, ‘I’ve knowed real hones’ hoss traders to make bad
breaks of that kind, now and then—honest intentions an’ all that, but
bad judgment,’—sez I—‘an’ I’ll cut it short by sayin’ that I’ll just
give you two an’ a half if you’ll match that no-count wind-broken black
as you thort that you swapped me.’

“‘Do you mean it?’ said Jud, solemn-like.

“‘I’ll make a bond to that effect,’ I said solemnly.

“Jud went off thoughtful. In a week or so he come back. He hung aroun’ a
while an’ said:

“‘I was up in the country the other day, an’ do you kno’ I saw a dead
match for yo’ black? Only a little slicker an’ better lookin’—same star
an’ white hind foot. As nigh like him as one black-eyed pea looks like
another.’

“‘Jud,’ I said, ‘I never did see two hosses look exactly alike. You’re
honestly mistaken.’

“‘They ain’t a hair’s difference,’ he said. ‘He’s a little slicker than
yours—that’s all—better groomed than the one in yo’ barn.’

“‘I reckon he is,’ said I, for I knew very well there wa’n’t none in my
barn. ‘That’s strange,’ I went on, ‘but you kno’ what I said.’

“‘Do you still hold to that offer?’ he axed.

“‘I’ll make bond with my daddy-in-law on it,’ I said.

“‘Nuff said,’ an’ Jud was gone. The next day he came back leading the
black, slicker an’ hence no-counter than ever, if possible.

“‘Look at him,’ he said, proudly—‘a dead match for yourn. Jes’ han’ me
that two an’ a half an’ take him. You now have a team worth a thousan’.’

“I looked the hoss over plum’ surprised like.

“‘Why, Jud,’ I said as softly as I cu’d, for I was nigh to bustin’, an’
I had a lot of friends come to see the sho’, an’ they standin’ ’round
stickin’ their old hats in their mouths to keep from explodin’—‘Why,
Jud, my dear friend,’ I said, ‘ain’t you kind o’ mistaken about this? I
said a match for the black, an’ it peers to me like you’ve gone an’
bought the black hisse’f an’ is tryin’ to put him off on me. No—no—my
kind frien’, you’ll not fin’ anything no-count enuff to be his match on
this terrestrial ball.’

“By this time you c’u’d have raked Jud’s eyes off his face with a
soap-gourd.

“‘What? W-h-a-t? He—why—I bought him of Dr. Sykes.’

“‘Why, that’s funny,’ I said, ‘but it comes in handy all round. If you’d
told me that the other day I might have told you,’ I said—‘yes, I might
have, but I doubt it—that I’d loaned him to Dr. Sykes an’ told him
whenever you offered him two hundred cash for him to let him go. Jes’
keep him,’ sez I, ‘till you find his mate, an’ I’ll take an oath to buy
’em.’”

Bud slapped his leg an’ yelled with delight.

“Whew,” said the Bishop—“not so loud. We’re at the church.

“But remember, Bud, it’s good policy allers to freeze. When you’re in
doubt—freeze!”




                  Early Apples—A Southern Opportunity

                    By R. A. WILKES, CULLEOKA, TENN.

  [Note: Mr. Wilkes has made a life study of this subject and speaks
  from a practical standpoint, at the request of the editor of
  Trotwood’s. He has, of course, confined his paper to the hill lands
  of the Middle South; but in the publicity which will be given by
  this publication, it is to be hoped other sections of the South will
  take advantage of this wonderful opportunity where their conditions
  are favorable.—Ed.]


Nature never gave to any people a fairer heritage than to the farmers of
Middle Tennessee. With a rich soil, a mild climate and an abundant
rainfall, it is in truth a garden spot. Adapted to the growth of nearly
every product necessary for man’s sustenance, covered with forests,
underlaid with minerals and phosphates, midway between the cold blasts
of the North and the excessive heat of the South, with cold, pure water
pouring from under every hill, and not a taint of malaria in the
atmosphere, it is the ideal farmer’s home. With all its advantages and
opportunities there should be the highest degree of success and
prosperity, and the owner of a Middle Tennessee farm should be the
happiest and most contented man that lives. That such is not the case in
recent years, however, is a lamentable fact.

Distinctly an agricultural people, prosperity depends upon the success
of the farmers, and that they are not prospering as they should is an
undeniable fact. The reason for this can be found in the fact that
Tennessee farmers have failed to realize the results of the marvelous
expansion and upheaval of the industrial conditions that have come as
the result of building railways and the invention of labor-saving
machinery. There was a time when the owners of these rich hills and
valleys could successfully meet all competitors in the markets then
accessible, and growing all their own supplies, the sale of their
surplus products kept the balance always in their favor. But with the
building of railways that opened up vast acres of rich territory, and
the invention of machinery that multiplied many fold the products of
labor, new centers of production were made accessible, and where
Tennesseans once had the markets all to themselves, new competitors came
in, and with this new competition came the beginning of the end of their
supremacy in growing many standard products. Failing to realize the new
state of affairs, and unwilling to acknowledge defeat in lines they had
so long excelled in, they continued their efforts to compete with these
new forces in the same lines of production, and in the unequal contest
sacrificed much of their rich soil rather than be driven from their
beaten paths into lines to which they were strangers. They failed to
look facts squarely in the face and to recognize their true condition,
and continued to struggle against an ever-increasing balance that in the
end could only bring disaster. Take a plain business view of the
situation and consider the chances an average Middle Tennessee farmer
has in growing grain crops upon his rolling land and steep hillsides,
rich though they be, when he must meet in competitive markets grain
grown in that great area known as the West, with its broad, level fields
and virgin soil, where the labor of one man controlling perfect working
machinery so far surpasses the same labor upon his restricted, rough
area. Labor is always the greatest cost of production, and the physical
character of a large part of Middle Tennessee will always prevent that
economical use of machinery that is available to the Western farmer in
growing grain and other farm products in the handling of which machinery
is effective. No people can permanently prosper who must meet in
competitive markets the cheaper grown products of more favored sections,
for while they may have a degree of prosperity in periods of high prices
like the present, yet, when the low price periods come, as come they
will, they bring loss and often ruin to the weak competitor, for it is
Nature’s law that only the fittest shall survive. What then is to be the
future of Middle Tennessee farming? This question is hard to answer, not
for a lack of answer to the question, nor for a lack of products that
can be grown with success, but rather because there are so many ways to
meet it, and so many products to select from, and such a variety of
soils to select for, that it is more a question of adaptability and
location, and the fitness and taste of the individual than a want of
ways to meet the issue. There are many owners of large, level farms that
may still compete in growing all ordinary farm products, and there are
many who grow certain lines of live stock and have special markets for
their surplus, and others whose soil and location make profitable
different lines; and to these classes changes in their mode of farming
may not be desirable.

But the majority of Middle Tennessee farmers have only small farms, all
more or less rolling, and many of them too rough and steep for the
economical use of machinery, and for these some change in their system
is an absolute necessity.

There should be grown upon every farm two distinct lines of products—the
one for home consumption, for these can always be utilized for much more
than their market value, and Tennessee farmers as a rule pursue the
right course in regard to their own supplies; but it is in the products
that are grown for market that the mistake has been made, and they must
change this line, and grow those that give greater returns per acre, and
a greater value for the labor, and quit growing those lines that bring
them in direct competition with labor that is supplemented by the use of
machinery.

While much of the virgin soil has been washed from the rich hills of
this Middle Tennessee country in the endeavor to meet competition and to
regain lost supremacy, yet its natural advantages are so great and the
soil is so richly stored with the elements of plant food that it
recuperates rapidly, and when under a new system, with intensive
farming, and a proper rotation and selection of crops that suit its
varied soil, and in the sale of which her farmers can stand upon the top
round of the ladder, and look down upon, instead of up to, their
competitors, as they do now, then will this grand commonwealth flourish
as it never did, and its farmers will reap a harvest of prosperity
unsurpassed by that of any farmers upon earth.

Among the many products that can be grown with the greatest assurance of
success, I know of none with results more certain and sure to give rich
returns for the labor bestowed, nor more exempt from hurtful
competition, than that of growing the early varieties of apples upon the
hills and uplands of this great basin. Ninety-five per cent of all the
apples grown are winter varieties, and with the utmost care in handling,
and the best facilities that cold storage can give for keeping them,
there is a period of several months in the early summer when the markets
are bare of apples, except a remnant of stale cold storage stock; and it
is at this scarce period when prices are highest, competition least and
demand greatest, that our early apples are at their best, and supply an
urgent demand for the fruit acids so necessary at this season to the
people of cold climates, to eliminate the effects of living many months
upon rich, heating foods. Fruit acids are Nature’s remedy for many ills,
and they are indispensable where the winters are long and cold; and in
no fruit are these acids so rich and so well adapted to the needs of man
as in the apple; and no apple is ready for use at so opportune a time as
these Tennessee grown early kinds. They are ready for use at a season
when all fruits are scarce, and the market is an open one, from which
Tennesseans can reap a rich harvest if they will take advantage of the
opportunity presented. Only a few years since fruits were a luxury of
the rich, and were not considered articles of food; but as their value
became known under the modern rational ideas of living, they have
quickly become necessities; and where obtainable, are staple foods upon
the tables of every class and condition of man. Among fruits the apple
stands pre-eminent for its many uses and great healthfulness; and he is
a poor provider indeed who does not supply his family with this, the
most healthful and palatable dish that can go upon his table in some of
its many prepared forms. The supply of apples has not increased in the
same ratio that consumption has, for it takes time to grow orchards, and
older orchards die; but the demand is an ever increasing one. These
early apples sell much higher than the winter varieties, and the
territory that can grow them is so limited that low prices need not be
feared. They cost much less to grow, for they mature before the drouths
and storms of summer come, and are less subject to damage by insects and
fungus disease. Middle Tennessee is the heart of the territory that can
grow choice apples that mature in that bare season, the months of June
and July, and should, and I believe will, be the center of this industry
in the years to come. Farther South the apple does not grow with any
success, and north of us they do not mature in time to compete, and
there is only a small zone east and west of us that can grow them, and
we have at least two months with practically no competition, and an
unlimited demand. With the rapid and constantly improving facilities for
moving this class of freight these apples can be put into any of the
cities in perfect condition, shipped in ordinary cars without the heavy
ice changes that most fruits must bear. With the limited area available
for their production, and the small amount now grown, it will take years
to furnish an adequate supply; and the greatest danger will be the
scarcity and not an overproduction, for with greater supplies the buyers
will come and the markets will be at our doors.

With more growers and greater supplies will come organization.
Associations will be formed, and instead of haphazard individual
shipments, the crop will be handled in a systematic way, and be
distributed to meet the needs of the different markets. The railroads
will be ready helpers along these lines, for they realize the importance
to their own interests of fostering enterprises of this kind. The L. &
N. R. R. is now doing a great work in encouraging the increased growth
of this class of products and give assurance of their ready co-operation
at all times. This industry has passed the experimental stage, and it is
an assured fact that these early apples will become a standard
production of Middle Tennessee. It has been demonstrated by practical
tests that the hills of Tennessee are especially adapted to this class
of fruits, and the great success that has followed the efforts of the
few who had the foresight to anticipate the coming results, and the
nerve to back their views is a sure indication of what the future will
develop along this line.

The pioneer in this line of business was Mr. W. L. Wilkes, of Spring
Hill, Tennessee, and the success that he achieved has been followed by
the planting of many large orchards around him that will soon be
yielding a harvest to their owners. He is too modest to say much of the
profits, but the facts are so patent that his neighbors are following
his example and a revolution is taking place in the farming of that
section. He claims that there is better profit in growing these apples
now than when he began, for the business was then a venture, and the
fruit was unknown upon the market, but now growing them is an assured
fact, and there is a demand for all that can be supplied. The question
of varieties, too, has been settled by experience, while then it was a
matter of test.

Fruit well grown and handled has ever been the most profitable of all
crops; and certainly a better opportunity was never offered to any
people than this one offers to the farmers of Tennessee and other
Southern States. Knowing what has already been done and the success
already achieved, it offers an opportunity to the man who has a taste
for fruit growing and has the energy and capacity to properly care for
an orchard, and the patience to wait for its fruiting, an assurance of
success greater than that of almost any other business. And when his
orchard has passed its fruitful age, and ceased to be profitable, it
leaves the soil as rich as that of a virgin forest, as an inheritance
for his children.

It must not be inferred that good results will be had in growing apples,
or any kinds of fruit without up-to-date methods of culture; for fruits
do not take kindly to careless and slovenly ways. There are many details
necessary to success, and explicit directions cannot be given in an
article of this kind that will be a sufficient guide to those who have
no practical knowledge of fruit growing. There are some general rules,
however, that apply in all cases, and that cannot be too strongly
emphasized. No one should go into commercial fruit growing without first
considering well their surroundings as to soil, location, shipping
facilities and other matters of that kind, and more especially to their
own fitness for the business. A man must have an adaptability to, and a
taste for, any business to make a success of it, for each individual
has, more or less, an adaptation for some calling; and many of the
failures in life are the result of the individual’s failing to get into
the right channel.

The right person with the proper surroundings, having settled the
question of planting in the affirmative, there will come many matters of
detail that will require the exercise of common sense and judgment, and
for the practice of which no specific rules can be given. I do not know
any better way to help beginners than to tell them some of the things
they should not do, and thereby prevent their making some costly
mistakes.

The most important question to be decided by a commercial planter is
that of varieties, for they must be of the kinds to suit the market
demands, must be regular bearers and barrel-fillers, and must ripen in
succession. Don’t plant many varieties, for they must be shipped in
carloads, and each variety should be ample for that purpose. Don’t plant
novelties, the kinds that have all the good points and that never fail
to bear, regardless of frosts and freezes, and are so often palmed off
at fancy prices by smooth-talking salesmen who always have the perfect
kinds; for when your “perfect kinds” begin to show up their crops of
crabs and seedlings your smooth agent will be far away practicing his
games upon other suckers. The perfect apple is yet a vision of the
future, and need not be expected until the perfect man comes.

Confine your commercial planting to well tested kinds that have
succeeded in locations similar to yours. Don’t buy inferior trees
because they are cheap. You are planting for a lifetime, and your time
and money will be worse than wasted trying to grow profitable orchards
from inferior stock. Life is too short to waste it waiting for diseased
trees to drag along for years and then die just as their fruitings
should begin. Buy the best trees that you can get; for if you are not
willing to pay a fair price for good stock, don’t go into the business;
for that very fact is conclusive proof that you have missed your
calling. Having made your selection of varieties, and bought good trees,
don’t let them lie around exposed to sun and air until half dead and
then blame the nurseryman if they fail to grow. A tree is a thing of
life and loses vitality every hour it is exposed, and it will need all
of its vitality in adapting itself to its new home, and to recover from
its rude removal from where it grew. Don’t buy old trees, thinking you
will gain a year’s time in growth and fruiting, for such will not be the
case. All experienced planters agree that one-year apple trees will live
better, grow better and bear fruit as early as older ones. They can be
bought for less money, are easier to plant and can be pruned to grow the
style of tree you want. Only the thrifty, healthy trees are large enough
for planting at one year old, and in buying them you run no risk of
getting inferior stock.

Don’t plant without a thorough preparation of the soil, for no after
care will compensate for the bad effect of careless preparation. The
first year is the crucial period in the life of a tree; it has lost in
removal many of its roots, and practically all of those fine, fibrous
feeders through which it drank life from the soil; and while nature has
stored in its cells a reserve supply of vitality, yet it needs every aid
that can be given to enable it to overcome the loss of roots and the
shock of removal and to succeed in its efforts to become established in
its new home. Do not forget that the success or failure of your orchard
will be largely owing to the manner of planting and to the treatment
that it gets during the first year.

Having planted first-class, one-year trees in well prepared soil, cut
them down to stubs eighteen to twenty-four inches high and let them
branch close to the ground, for if there is a single reason for growing
a long-bodied tree I have never heard it. On the contrary, there are
many reasons against it. Let every twig that starts grow the first year,
for they will be needed to furnish leaves to assimilate the food taken
up by the roots, and to return the solid part to increase the growth of
trees and root. You have now only the question of cultivation, and that
should be the best that you can give. Plant the orchard in some suitable
crop, preferably a low growing one, that requires hoe work, but leave
ample space next to the trees for continuous cultivation, and keep that
space clear of grass and weeds, for the trees cannot compete in their
new surroundings with these gross drinkers of the water that is in the
soil, that will be so badly needed to start their growth. Should the
summer be dry, keep a dust mulch by frequent cultivation with light
harrows or sweeps until the fall rains come, and if your soil is
reasonably fertile, the growth the trees will make will be a surprise
and pleasure, and the hardest period in growing your orchard will be a
thing of the past. Get all the information you can from practical fruit
growers; study the bulletins of the National Agricultural Department and
of the State Experimental Station; read the papers and magazines that
treat of these subjects; seek every available source of information; and
having digested the opinions and practices of others, formulate your own
opinions, map out the course you believe most suitable to your
surroundings and follow the dictates of your own judgment. Continue this
line of action through the coming years, adapting your methods to suit
the condition of your orchard from year to year, and if you have
exercised good common sense success is as certain to reward your efforts
as anything in this life can be certain that is dependent upon human
effort and the vicissitudes of drouths, storms and frosts.




                             The Army Horse

   By O. M. NORTON, V. M. D., VETERINARIAN ARTILLERY CORPS, U. S. A.


Knowing that the method of purchase and the kind of horse required in
the military service of the United States is a matter of interest to
both horse breeders and dealers, the scarcity of horses meeting these
requirements has caused me to write this article, for Trotwood’s.


                    First, as to Method of Purchase.

The buying of horses is done by the Quartermaster’s Department of the
army, the number of horses bought at any one time depending on the needs
of the service at that time. This number may vary from one to two to
hundreds and even thousands. Bids are advertised for, giving the number
of horses required, and the date on which they are to be delivered to
the government. Then contractors or dealers in horses put in their bids
at the prices at which they will furnish the required number of horses.
The bids are opened on a certain date, and the lowest bidder is given
the contract. Soon after the contract is awarded, a Board of Officers is
appointed to inspect and buy the horses that the contractor brings
before the Board, providing, of course, that the horses fulfill the
specifications of the contract.

A horse purchasing Board usually consists of from three to five members.
One of these officers is from the Quartermaster’s Department, U. S.
Army, the others being usually members of the Cavalry or Artillery;
there is also a Veterinarian to inspect the horses in regard to
soundness. He may be either a Quartermaster’s Veterinarian (civilian) or
a Veterinarian of the Cavalry or Artillery.


                Usual Requirements of Horses Purchased.

The horses bought consist principally of two types, viz.: the Cavalry
horse, weighing from 950 to 1,150 pounds; and the Artillery horse,
weighing from 1050 to 1300 pounds.

Cavalry Horse: The requirements of most contracts say that the horses
must be sound and well-bred; gentle under the saddle; free from vicious
habits, with free and prompt action at the walk, trot and canter;
without blemish or defect; with easy mouth and gait, and otherwise to
conform to the following description: a gelding of uniform or hardy
color; in good condition; from 15 ¼ to 16 hands high; weight from 950 to
1150 pounds; age from four to eight years; head and ears small; forehead
broad; eyes large and prominent; vision perfect in every respect;
shoulders long and sloping well back; chest full, broad and deep;
forelegs straight and standing well under; barrel large and increasing
from girth toward flank; back short and straight; loins and haunches
broad and muscular; hocks well bent and under the horse; pasterns
slanting and feet small and sound.

Artillery Horse: The Artillery horse has in general about the same
requirements described for the Cavalry horse, with the following
exceptions: weight being from 1050 to 1300 pounds; should be more of a
draught horse type, as he is required to work in harness, as well as
under saddle; shoulders should be well-muscled, so as to give good
support to the collar; hindquarter should be heavy and strong; the horse
should not be what is known as “beefy” or lymphatic type, but should be
active on his feet and thus able to turn quickly.

Price: The price at present ranges from a hundred and fifty to a hundred
and seventy-five dollars, probably about a hundred and sixty for Cavalry
horses; Artillery horses being somewhat higher, one hundred and
sixty-five to one hundred and eighty dollars.

When a horse is shown to the Board for purchase he is inspected by the
Board first in regard to general conformation, height, weight, muscular
development, bones, etc.; whether he is high in withers, thus liable to
sore back and bruises by saddle; length of back, thus whether able to
carry weight; should have short back with good muscular development;
should not be ewe-necked or bull-necked, thus hard to control and never
making a good saddle animal.

Color: Bays, browns, blacks and sorrels are the colors best suited for
the service. Grays are sometimes taken, there often being a gray horse
troop in the regiment, but are not as preferable as the hardier colors.

Sex: Only geldings are accepted, mares and stallions not being taken,
excepting in times of great necessity, as during war.

Gaits: Walk, trot and canter being the three gaits prescribed by Army
Regulations, pacing or single-foot horses are not desired in the
service. And here is where the writer expects to receive Trotwood’s
condemnation. However, if they do pace they are used in the army, and
the writer has often noticed how quickly both officers and men will pick
a pacing horse, or one that single-foots for their mount if allowed to
do so, thus proving, that although we may condemn the pacer openly, deep
down in our hearts we have a soft spot for him who carries us many miles
with so little effort to himself or us.

After the horse is inspected for general conformation he is trotted to
see his action, also to see whether he goes sound, is a paddler,
string-halt, interferes, etc. He is then examined by the Veterinarian as
to defects, age, eyesight, etc. If affected with any enlargement or
weakness of tendons, hocks as to spavins, thorough-pins, curbs;
examining pasterns for sidebones, ringbones, quittor, wire scars, etc.,
he is rejected. Sometimes horses are taken with small splints, also with
small wire scars, especially in this Western country, where wire fences
are so common. If shod, shoes are removed to examine feet thoroughly for
quarter-crack, false-quarter, founder, corns, etc. The eyes are
thoroughly examined for any signs of defects, and in this country,
Middle West, where periodic ophthalmia is so often seen, it is often
hard to tell where a horse has had a few light attacks of it in the
past, and it is well for the Veterinarian to reject a horse that is the
least suspicious, thus being on the safe side.

If the horse examined is not sound in every respect he should be
rejected, and any one desiring to furnish horses for an army contract
had better read carefully the specifications stated above and then start
out to compare the horses of his neighborhood with the specifications as
set forth, and he will find that there are very few that are truly sound
and able to pass muster. Where the horse is accepted by the purchasing
Board he is branded on the left shoulder with the letters “U. S.,” and
often there is also branded on his hoof a number, and he is then ready
for shipment to the place where he is needed for service.

Besides the two classes of horses mentioned, there are also a few very
heavy draught horses bought for two batteries of siege Artillery, these
horses weighing from 1300 to 1500 pounds. There are also bought by the
government a few horses for special purposes, as horses used in the Fire
Department and horses used in the Quartermaster’s Department as drivers,
etc.

The specifications of most contracts say that the horses shall be well
bred, but owing to the scarcity at present of horses, and the high
prices paid for highly bred horses, we often find in the service horses
that show none or very little indication of any breeding.


            Disposal of Horses Unfit for Government Service.

Horses that fail to give good service, or are not able to do the work
required, or are unsuited for the purpose for which they were bought,
are inspected and condemned and sold at public auction to the highest
bidder; when condemned are branded with the letters “I. C.” (inspected
and condemned). This brand is placed on the side of the neck under the
mane.




                        The History of the Hals
                  THE FATHER OF THE TURF IN TENNESSEE.
                              CHAPTER VI.

                         By JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE


“Uncle Berry,” continued Mr. Peyton, “I find, arrived in Tennessee in
the month of February, 1806. In the spring of that year he made a match
of mile heats, $500 a side, over the Hartsville course, with Henrietta
against Cotton’s Cygnet, which he won.

“The old men of the neighborhood manifested great sympathy for the young
stranger, and predicted that Lazarus Cotton would ruin him.

“This was his first race in Tennessee, and I witnessed his last, which
was run over the Albion course at Gallatin, in 1862.

“Shortly after the race at Hartsville, Uncle Berry trained a famous
quarter race mare called Sallie Friar, by Jolly Friar, and made a match
for $500 a side, which was run on Goose Creek, near the Poison Knob.
Sallie was the winner, and she was afterwards purchased by Patton
Anderson, who ran her with great success.

“In the fall of 1806 Uncle Berry won with Post Boy the Jockey Club
purse, three mile heats, at Gallatin, beating General Jackson’s Escape
and others. Escape was the favorite, and the General and Mrs. Jackson,
who were present, backed him freely. Before this race he sold Post Boy
to Messrs. Richard and William L. Alexander for $1,000 in the event of
his winning the race, after which he was withdrawn from the turf. Here
he first met General Jackson and made a match with him on Henrietta
against Bibb’s mare for $1,000 a side, two mile heats, equal weights,
though the General’s mare was two years older than Henrietta, to come
off in the spring of 1807 at Clover Bottom. The result proved that Uncle
Berry underrated the horses and trainers of the Tennessee turf, as the
General’s mare, a thoroughbred daughter of imported Diomed, won the
race.

“The General, though deprived of the pleasure of being present on that
interesting occasion (having been summoned as a witness in the trial of
Aaron Burr at Richmond) showed that his heart was in the race, as
appears from a letter to his friend, Patton Anderson, dated June 16, and
published in Parton’s ‘Life of Jackson,’ from which I quote:

“‘At the race I hope you will see Mrs. Jackson; tell her not to be
uneasy. I will be home as soon as my obedience to the precept of my
country will permit. I have only to add as to the race, that the mare of
Williams’ is thought here to be a first-rate animal of her size; but if
she can be put up to it, she will fail in one heat. It will be then
proper to put her up to all she knows at once.’

“This is Jacksonian. Not many men would take the responsibility of
giving orders of how to run a race at the distance of five hundred
miles. This error of underrating an adversary, especially such an
adversary, was a heavy blow to Uncle Berry, from which he did not fully
recover until he started Haynie’s Maria, mounted by Monkey Simon,
against him.

“Not long after this defeat he set out to search for a horse with which
to beat General Jackson, and purchased from General Wade Hampton, of
South Carolina, a gelding called Omar, bringing him to Tennessee. After
recruiting his horse at Captain Alexander’s, near Hartsville, he went to
Nashville and offered General Jackson a match for $1,000 a side, three
mile heats, according to rule. This the General declined, offering
instead the same terms as to weight, as in the former race, in which he
was allowed two years’ advantage, a proposition which, of course, was
not accepted.

“Unable to get a race in Tennessee, Uncle Berry took his horse to
Natchez, Miss., traveling through the swamps of the Chickasaw and
Choctaw Nations, and entered him in a stake, three mile heats, $200
entrance; but his bad luck pursued him, and just before the race his
horse snagged his foot, and he paid forfeit. He remained near Natchez
twelve months and nursed his horse as no other man could have done,
until he was perfectly restored to health and in condition for the
approaching fall races of 1808. Writing to Col. George Elliott, he urged
him to come to Natchez and bring fifteen or twenty horses to bet on
Omar, and also to bring Monkey Simon to ride him, which Colonel Elliott
did.

“Simon’s appearance on the field alarmed the trainer of the other horse,
who had known him in South Carolina, and, suspecting that Omar was a
bite, he paid forfeit.

“As Simon was a distinguished character, and made a conspicuous figure
on the turf of Tennessee for many years, it may be well to give some
account of him. His sobriquet of ‘Monkey Simon’ conveys a forcible idea
of his appearance. He was a native African, and was brought with his
parents when quite young to South Carolina, before the prohibition of
the slave trade took effect. In height he was four feet six inches, and
weighed one hundred pounds. He was a hunchback with very short body and
remarkably long arms and legs. His color and hair were African, but his
features were not. He had a long head and face, a high and delicate
nose, a narrow but prominent forehead, and a mouth indicative of humor
and firmness. It was rumored that Simon was a prince in his native
country. I asked Uncle Berry the other day if he thought it was true. He
replied, ‘I don’t know; they said so, and if the princes there had more
sense than the rest he must have been one of ’em, for he was the
smartest negro I ever saw.’ Colonel Elliott, speaking of Simon after his
death, said he was the coolest, bravest, wisest rider he ever saw mount
a horse, in which opinion Uncle Berry fully concurs.

“Simon was an inimitable banjo player and improvised his songs, making
humorous hits at everybody; even General Jackson did not escape him.
Indeed, no man was his superior in repartee.

“On one occasion Colonel Elliott and James Jackson, with a view to a
match race for $1,000 a side, a dash on two miles, on Paddy Carey
against Colonel Step’s mare, consented to lend Simon to ride this mare.

“Colonel Step not only gave Simon $100 in the race, but stimulated his
pride by saying they thought they could win races without him, whereas
he knew their success was owing to Simon’s riding. Somewhat offended at
the idea of being lent out, and by no means indifferent to the money,
Simon resolved to win the race, if possible; and nodding his head, said:
‘I’ll show ’em.’ The mare had the speed of Paddy and took the track, and
Simon, by his consummate skill and by intimidating the other rider,
managed to run him far out on the turns, while he rested his mare for a
brush on the stretches.

“On reaching the last turn Simon found the mare pretty tired, and Paddy,
a game four miler, locked with her, and he boldly swung out so far as to
leave Paddy in the fence corner. The boy came up and attempted to pass
on the inside, but Simon headed him off, and growled at him all the way
down the quarter stretch, beating him out by a neck. Simon could come
within a hair’s breadth of foul riding and yet escape the penalty.
Colonel Elliott lost his temper, which he rarely did, and abused Simon,
saying, ‘not satisfied with making Paddy run forty feet further than the
mare on every turn, he must ride foul all the way down the quarter
stretch.’

“The Colonel repeated these charges until at length Simon answered him
with, ‘Well, Colonel Elliott (as he always called him), I’ve won many a
race that way for you, and it is the first time I ever heard you object
to it.’”

                  *       *       *       *       *

Much has been said and written of the tenderness and care bestowed by
the Arabs on their favorite horses, but I doubt whether any Arabian
since the time of the Prophet ever showed such devotion to his favorite
steed as Uncle Berry to the thoroughbreds under his care. In fact, his
kindly nature embraced all domestic animals. For many years he resided
on a rich, productive farm near Gallatin, where he trained Betsy Malone,
Sarah Bladen and many other distinguished race horses; raised fine stock
and fine crops and proved himself to be one of the best farmers in the
neighborhood. He had pets of all kinds—huge hogs that would come and
sprawl themselves to be rubbed, and game chickens that would feed from
his hand, and followed him if he left home on foot, often obliging him
to return and shut them up.

He raised many celebrated racers for himself and others, and so
judicious was his system that, at the age of two, they had almost the
maturity of three-year-olds. His last thoroughbred was a chestnut filly,
foaled in 1859, by Lexington, dam Sally Roper (the dam of Berry), which
was entered in a stake for three-year-olds, $500 entrance, two mile
heats, to come off over the Albion course, near Gallatin, in the fall of
1862. This filly was, of course, a great favorite with Uncle Berry. She
never associated with any quadruped after she was weaned, her master
being her only companion. At two years old she was large and muscular
and very promising, and in the summer of 1861 I urged Uncle Berry to
send her to the race course (where I had Fannie McAlister, dam of
Muggins, and several other animals in training), that she might be
gentled and broken to ride. His reply was: “I have been thinking of your
kind offer—I know she ought to be broke, but, poor thing! she don’t know
anything; she has never been anywhere, and has never even been mounted.
I am afraid she will tear herself all to pieces.” But he finally
consented for my colored trainer, Jack Richlieu, to take her to the
track. On meeting Mrs. Williams a few days afterwards, I inquired for
Uncle Berry. Her reply was: “He is well enough as to health, but he is
mighty lonesome since the filly went away.”

But of all the horses he ever owned, Walk-in-the-Water was his especial
favorite. In the language of Burns, he “lo’ed him like a vera brither.”
He was a large chestnut gelding, foaled in 1813, by Sir Archie, dam by
Gondola, a thoroughbred son of Mark Anthony, and these two were the only
pure crosses in his pedigree, yet he was distinguished on the turf until
fifteen years old, more especially in races of three and four mile
heats.

I was present when Walk, at nineteen years of age, ran his last race, of
four mile heats, over the Nashville course, against Polly Powell.

Uncle Berry, several years before, had presented him to Thomas Foxall,
with a positive agreement that he would neither train nor run him again;
having a two-year-old in training, Mr. Foxall took up the old horse
merely to gallop in company with him, a few weeks before the Nashville
meeting.

It became well known that the mare would start for the four mile purse,
and she was so great a favorite that no one would enter against her.

The proprietor, to prevent a “walkover,” induced Foxall to allow him to
announce Walk-in-the-Water, whose name would be sure to draw a crowd.
There was a large attendance, and the game old horse made a wonderful
race, considering his age, running a heat and evidently losing in
consequence of his want of condition. When the horses were brought out I
missed Uncle Berry, and went in search of him. I found him in the grove
alone, sitting on a log and looking very sad. “Are you not going up to
see old Walk run?” I inquired. “No, I would as soon see a fight between
my grandfather and a boy of twenty,” he replied.

In the year 1827, when Walk was fourteen years old, Uncle Berry took him
and several colts that were entered in stakes to Natchez, Miss.,
traveling by land through the terrible swamps of the Chickasaw and
Choctaw Nations. The colts had made very satisfactory trial runs in
Tennessee, but suffered so severely from the journey that they either
paid forfeits or lost their stakes, so that Walk-in-the-Water was the
only hope for winning expenses. He was entered in the four mile race of
the Jockey Club, and his only competitor was the b. gelding Archie
Blucher, fifteen years old, a horse of great fame as a “four miler” in
Mississippi.

On the evening before the race the Jockey Club met and changed the rule,
reducing the weight on all horses of fifteen years or upward to one
hundred pounds, leaving all others their full weight, or one hundred and
twenty-four pounds, three pounds less for mares and geldings.

This extraordinary proceeding would not have been tolerated by the
gentlemen who, at a later day, composed that Club, but Uncle Berry
protested in vain against the injustice done him. He, however, concluded
to run Walk, giving his half brother twenty-one pounds advantage in
weight. Walk had the speed of Blucher, and when the drum tapped, took
the track, with Blucher at his side, and these two game Archies ran
locked through the heat, Walk winning by half a length. The second heat
was a repetition of the first, and never was a more tremendous struggle
witnessed on a race course—a blanket would have covered the horses from
the tap of the drum to the close of the race.

Any man who has watched a favorite horse winning a race, out of the fire
and blue blazes at that, can appreciate Uncle Berry’s feelings during
that terrible struggle. The horses swung into the quarter stretch, the
eighth and last mile, and Uncle Berry, seeing the sorrel face of his old
favorite ahead, cried out at the top of his voice, “Come home, Walk,
come home! Your master wants money, and that badly.” After the race he
expressed his opinion of the Club in no measured terms. Though
habitually polite and respectful, particularly toward the authorities of
a Jockey Club, he was a man of undaunted courage and ready to resist
oppression, irrespective of consequences, but his friends interposed and
persuaded him to let the matter pass.

When he reached the stables the horses were being prepared for their
night’s rest, and he made them each an address. “Jo,” he said to a
Pacolet colt, named Jo Doan, that had lost his stake in slow time, “you
won’t do to tie to; I’ve always done a good part by you. I salted you
out of my hand while you sucked your mammy; you know what you promised
me before you left home (alluding to a trial run), and now you have
thrown me off among strangers,” and he passed on, complaining of the
other colts. The groom was washing old Walk-in-the-Water’s legs while he
stood calm and majestic, with his game, intelligent head, large,
brilliant eyes, inclined shoulders and immense windpipe, looking every
inch a hero. When Uncle Berry came to him he threw his arms around his
neck and said, bursting into tears, “Here’s a poor old man’s friend in a
distant land.”

Walk-in-the-Water won more long races than any horse of his day. If I
can procure the early volumes of the American Turf Register, I will in a
future number give some account of his performances.

Haney’s Maria was a most extraordinary race nag at all distances,
probably not inferior to any which has appeared in America since her
day. She was bred by Bennet Goodrum, of Virginia, who moved to North
Carolina, where she was foaled in the spring of 1808; from there he
removed to Tennessee, and, in the fall of 1809, sold Maria to Capt.
Jesse Haney, of Sumner County. She was by imported Diomed, one of the
last of his get when thirty years of age. Her first dam was by Taylor’s
Bel-Air (the best son of imported Medley), second dam by Symmes’ Wild
Air, third dam by imported Othello, out of an imported mare.

She was a dark chestnut, exactly fifteen hands high, possessing great
strength, muscular power, and symmetry, the perfect model of a race
horse. Maria commenced her turf career at three, and ran all distances
from a quarter of a mile to four mile heats, without losing a race or
heat until she was nine years old. In the fall of 1811 she ran a
sweepstake over the Nashville course, entrance $100, two mile heats,
beating General Jackson’s colt, Decatur, by Truxton; Col. Robert Bell’s
filly, by imported Diomed, and four others; all distanced the first
heat, except Bell’s filly. This defeat aroused the fire and combative
spirit of General Jackson almost as much as did his defeat by Mr. Adams
for the Presidency, and he swore “by the Eternal” he would beat her if a
horse could be found in the United States able to do so. But, although
the General conquered the Indians, defeated Packenham, beat Adams and
Clay, crushed the monster bank under the heel of his military boot, he
could not beat Maria, in the hands of Uncle Berry.

In the fall of 1812, over the same course, she won a sweepstake, $500
entrance, four mile heats, beating Colonel Bell’s Diomed mare, a horse
called Clifden, and Col. Ed Bradley’s “Dungannon.” (General Jackson was
interested in Dungannon.) This was a most exciting and interesting race,
especially to the ladies, who attended in great numbers; those of
Davidson County, with Aunt Rachel Jackson and her niece, Miss Rachel
Hays, at their head, backing Dungannon, while the Sumner County ladies,
led by Miss Clarissa Bledsoe, daughter of the pioneer hero, Col. Anthony
Bledsoe, bet their last glove on little Maria. After this second defeat,
General Jackson became terribly in earnest, and before he gave up the
effort to beat Maria, he ransacked Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia and
Kentucky. He was almost as clamorous for a horse as was Richard in the
battle of Bosworth Field. He first wrote Col. William R. Johnson to send
him the best four mile horse in Virginia, without regard to price,
expressing a preference for the famous Bel-Air mare, Old Favorite.
Colonel Johnson sent him, at a high price, the celebrated horse,
Pacolet, by imported Citizen, who had greatly distinguished himself as a
four miler in Virginia. In the fall of 1813, at Nashville, Maria won a
sweepstake, $1,000 entrance, $500 forfeit, four mile heats, beating
Pacolet with great ease, two paying forfeit. It was said that Pacolet
had received an injury in one of his fore ankles. The General, being
anything but satisfied with the result, made a match on Pacolet against
Maria for $1,000 a side, $500 forfeit, four mile heats, to come off over
the same course, the fall of 1814; but, Pacolet being still lame, he
paid forfeit. These repeated failures only made the General more
inflexible in his purpose, and, in conjunction with Mr. James Jackson,
who then resided in the vicinity of Nashville, he sent to South Carolina
and bought Tam O’Shanter, a horse distinguished in that state.

The fall of 1814 Maria won, over the same course, club purse of $275,
two mile heats, beating Tam O’Shanter, William Lytle’s Royalist, and two
or three others.

A few days after, over the same course, she won a proprietor’s purse,
$350, only one starting against her. About this time General Jackson
sent to Georgia and purchased of Colonel Alston Stump-the-Dealer, but,
for some cause, did not match him against Maria. The General then sent
to Kentucky and induced Mr. DeWett to come to the Hermitage with his
mare (reputed to be the swiftest mile nag in the United States), with a
view of matching her against Maria. Mr. DeWett trained his mare at the
Hermitage. In the fall of 1814, at Clover Bottom, Maria beat this mare
for $1,000 a side, dash of a mile. In the fall of 1815 General Jackson
and Mr. DeWett ran the same mare against Maria, dash of half a mile, for
$1,500 a side, $500 on the first quarter, $500 on six hundred yards, and
$500 on the half mile, all of which bets were won by Maria, the last by
one hundred feet. This was run at Nashville. The next week, over same
course, she won a match $1,000 a side, mile heats, made with General
Jackson and Col. Ed Ward, beating the Colonel’s horse, Western Light.
Soon after this race she was again matched against her old competitor,
DeWett’s mare, for $1,000 a side, over the same course (which was in
McNairy’s Bottom, above the sulphur spring), Maria giving her a distance
(which was then 120 yards) in a dash of two miles. Colonel Lynch, of
Virginia, had been induced to come and bring his famous colored rider,
Dick, to ride DeWett’s mare. Before the last start Uncle Berry directed
his rider (also colored) to put the spurs to Maria from the tap of the
drum. But, to his amazement, they went off at a moderate gait, DeWett’s
mare in the lead, making the first mile in exactly two minutes. As they
passed the stand Uncle Berry ordered his boy to go on, but the mares
continued at the same rate until after they entered the back stretch,
Maria still a little in the rear, when the rider gave her the spurs and
she beat her competitor one hundred and eighty yards, making the last
mile in one minute and forty-eight seconds. All who saw the race
declared that she made the most extraordinary display of speed they ever
witnessed.

When Uncle Berry demanded an explanation of his rider he learned that
Dick, who professed to be a conjurer, or spiritualist, had frightened
the boy by threatening that if he attempted to pass ahead of him until
they ran a mile and a quarter, he would lift him out of his saddle, or
throw down his mare by a mere motion of his whip, which the boy fully
believed. Most negroes at that time, and some white people in this
enlightened age, believe in these absurdities. The speed of Maria was
wonderful. She and the famous quarter race horse, Saltram, were trained
by Uncle Berry at the same time, and he often “brushed” them through the
quarter stretch, “and they always came out locked.” Whichever one got
the start kept the lead.

After the last race above mentioned, some Virginians present said that
there were horses in Virginia that could beat Maria. Captain Haney
offered to match her against any horse in the world, from one to four
mile heats, for $5,000.

Shortly after this conversation, meeting General Jackson, Captain Haney
informed him what had passed, and the General, in his impressive manner,
replied: “Make the race for $50,000, and consider me in with you. She
can beat any animal in God’s whole creation.”

In March, 1816, at Lexington, Ky., she beat Robin Gray (sire of
Lexington’s third dam) a match, mile heats, for $1,000 a side. The next
month she beat at Cage’s race paths in Sumner County, near Bender’s
Ferry, Mr. John Childress’ Woodlawn filly, by Truxton, a straight half
mile for $1,000 a side, giving her sixty feet. Maria won this race by
two feet only. This was the first race I ever saw, and I was greatly
impressed with the beautiful riding of Monkey Simon.

After the race Maria was taken by Uncle Berry to Waynesboro, Ga., where
she bantered the world, but could not get a race. There were very few
jockey clubs in the country at that time.

In January, 1817, Maria was returned to Captain Haney in Sumner County,
and soon afterwards sold by him to Pollard Brown, who got her beaten at
Charleston in a four mile heat race with Transport and Little John, when
she was nine years old. Maria carried over weight, ran under many
disadvantages, and lost the race by only a few feet.


                       (Continued in next issue.)




                            Mammy and Memory


[Illustration: Photo by Julie A. Royster, Raleigh, N. C.]

                       Her work is done,
                       The setting sun
                     Throws twilight in her door.
                       Her work is done—
                       Her race is run,
                     Her friends have gone before.

                       “Mammy, goodnight!”
                       Heard she aright?
                     Low her head—and tenderly:
                       “Heish, chile, doan’ cry—
                       Sleep—sleep ‘bym-by!’”
                     Mammy and Memory.

                         JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE.

[Illustration]




             Nitrification of the Soil, or, How Plants Grow

              BY WILLIAM DENNISON OF FARGO, NORTH DAKOTA.


We will venture the assertion that when the history of the past century
is being written up, the chroniclers will discover that there has been
as much, if not more progress and advancement made in the nineteenth
century than in all of the eighteen centuries preceding it. The
advancement in the past century was phenomenal in the marvelous
achievements in inventions and in discoveries in every branch of
industry, in the arts and sciences; and I am delighted to know that
agriculture, horticulture and floriculture have also received some
attention, although not so much as might have been. Still, we are
pleased that a beginning in those branches has been made, and we hope
for much more rapid advancement within the next two decades.

That there has been a great awakening and a marked advancement in the
material progress in the past century no one will seek to controvert the
fact, but let us hope that while we have been making such rapid strides
materially we have also, during the same period, made equally as much
advancement spiritually, for to glorify God is (or ought to be) man’s
chief aim in life. There has been a beginning in the advancement of
scientific agriculture, and the agricultural world is indebted to no one
so much as to John Bennett Lawes, of Rothamsted, England, who devoted a
lifetime of study and the lands of his large estate to experimental
farming, the results of which he published from time to time in the
Gardener’s Chronicle, and at his death left a fund sufficient in trust
to carry on the great work he had begun and carried forward his
celebrated tests of experimental farming, extending over fifty years,
from 1844 to 1893. Indeed, John Bennett Lawes may justly be called the
father of the experimental stations in our country. In these earliest
experiments the effects of various manures were carried out. It was in
these trials that the excellent results obtained by manuring turnips
with phosphate previously treated with sulphuric acid were first
discovered, and his taking out a patent, in 1842, for treating mineral
phosphate with sulphuric acid, which was the commencement of the present
enormous manufacture of artificial manures. The above experiments were
carried on in pots by Mr. Lawes, but, in 1843, he was joined by Dr.
Gilbert, as eminent a chemist as was Mr. Lawes himself, and from 1844
began the field experiments, which have become world-wide for the great
benefits they have resulted in to agriculturists everywhere.

The Rothamsted estate was divided into small fields, and the effects of
the various crops on the fields with and without manure were carefully
noted. Soils were analyzed before the crops were planted, and also after
the crops were harvested, to determine the loss or gain of nitrogen.

The rotation of crops was studied thoroughly, and beans and peas were
then made one in a four-course rotation. But even earlier than 1844 it
had been observed that leguminous plants, of which there are thousands
distributed over this sphere, had a beneficial effect on the land for
the succeeding crop. At Rothamsted the legumes, or such of them as
beans, peas or red clover, were thoroughly tried, and it was invariably
found as one in a rotation of four to produce the same results. In some
way that they then could not explain, the land after a crop of legumes
was very much richer in nitrogen, amounting in many instances to 300
pounds per acre. These worthy gentlemen kept on for years trying to
account for the phenomenon and endeavored to discover the true source of
nitrification. But to the French chemists Schlosing and Muntz belong the
credit of establishing by experiment the true nature of nitrification.
Their first paper on the subject appeared early in 1877, or only
twenty-nine years ago. They wished to ascertain if the presence of humic
matter was essential to the purification of sewage by soil, and for this
purpose they conducted an experiment, in which sewage was passed slowly
through a column of sand and limestone. Under these circumstances
complete nitrification of the sewage took place. They then allowed a
chloroform vapor to fall for some time on top of the column, the sewage
passing as before. Nitrification now entirely ceased and was not renewed
for seven weeks, though the supply of chloroform was suspended. A small
quantity of nitrifying soil was shaken with the water and the turbid
extracts poured on the top of the column. Nitrification at once
recommenced, as strongly as before.

To appreciate the force of the experiment, Muntz had previously shown
that chloroform was a means of distinguishing between the action of a
simple ferment as diastase, and a living organism, as yeast, the
chloroform having no influence on the work of the unorganized ferment,
which immediately stopped the activity of a living agent. The above
discovery of Schlosing and Muntz of the true theory of nitrification of
the soil was the greatest achievement to the agricultural world,
inasmuch as it has been demonstrated by numerous eminent chemists and
proved to be an ascertained fact; and this problem solved, which had
occupied the ablest scientific minds for centuries. Now we hope for some
advancement with the farmers of the United States in the future. With
the discovery of Schlosing and Muntz there is no necessity for such an
idea as wornout land, as is prevalent in this great country, where the
chief occupation of the agriculturist has been in exploiting his land,
just in the same manner as everything else has been exploited. With an
ever increasing population of this sphere, there is no need to fear the
earth’s capacity in producing enough to supply all their wants. That is
when our farmers realize the paramount importance of the above
discovery, and begin to see how bountifully an all-wise Creator has
provided for us in placing these legumes on this earth for the benefit
of mankind. They are a double blessing to us, for they not only abstract
nitrogen from the atmosphere and deposit it in the ground for the
succeeding crops, and restore the fertility of the land, but also, when
they are made one in a four-course rotation, fill the soil with fibre or
roots, which no soil can be in its highest productive condition without.




                          The Great New South


In the past quarter of a century (1880–1905) from statistics gathered by
Richard H. Edmonds, Trotwood’s finds the South has doubled the value of
her cotton crop, her exports and her assessed property; has trebled her
manufacturing products, her railroad mileage and the value of her farm
products. She has multiplied by five her lumber products, increased her
manufacturing capital six-fold, her tons of pig iron produced
eight-fold, her phosphate tons mined nine-fold, her cotton bales
consumed ten-fold, her capital invested in cotton mills eleven-fold, her
tons of coal mined twelve-fold, her number of spindles on cotton mills
fourteen-fold, her tons of coke produced sixteen-fold, her number of
cotton oil mills seventeen-fold, her capital invested in cotton oil
mills eighteen-fold, and her barrels of petroleum two hundred and
thirty-five-fold!

She raised three-fourths of the world’s cotton, and has one-half of the
standing timber of the whole country. Her own cotton mills consume
2,282,900 bales yearly, or nearly as much as New England and all the
rest of the country combined, whereas in 1880 she consumed but one-sixth
as much as New England. Europe pays her a tribute of over _one million
dollars daily for cotton_. Thus marches on the Great New South.




                     Bre’r Washington’s Consolation

                     Saturday night my wife died,
                       Sunday she was buried,
                     Monday was my kotin’ day
                       And Chewsday I got married.


Whenever I heard the old man singing I knew he was in a reminiscent mood
and so I put down my book and went out to the barn, where he was
building a pen to put the fattening Berkshires in. For a month these
slick rascals had been running in the ten-acre lot planted in corn and,
at the “lay-by plowing,” sown in peas, all for their especial benefit.
The corn had nearly ripened and the peas were in the pod; and now, day
after day they had wallowed in the water of the ten-acre field branch or
torn down the tempting corn stalks or eaten the juicy peas till their
tails had taken on the two-ring curl of contentment and they had grown
too fat to run in so large a lot.

“An’ now dey must be put in de parlor,” said the old man as he proceeded
to build their pen, “an’ fed on poun’ cake an’ punkins. Fust er good dry
pen, bilt on er solid blue lime-rock, ef you so forechewnate es to lib
in Middle Tennessee, an’ ef you don’t lib heah,” he half soliloquized,
“jes’ bild it in sum mud hole an’ be dun wid it, fur you ain’t gwi’
fatten your horgs no-how ef youn don’t lib in Tennessee,” he said, with
a sly wink. “Den, arter you gits the pen bilt bring up a load ob yaller
punkins to sharpen up dey appletights an’ start ’em off right; den
plenty ob dis year’s cohn wid er sour-meal mash ebry now and den to keep
’em eatin’ good, an’ den, chile, ’long erbout Krismas time jes’ sot your
mouf fur spairribs an’ sawsages—e—yum, yum, yum”—and he wiped the corner
of his mouth suspiciously.

                  “Ole Naper cum to my house
                    I thout he cum to see me,
                  But when I cum to find him out,
                    He’s ’swade my wife to leave me.”

he sang again. “I’ll tell you, suh,” he laughed, “I can’t see what
fatnin’ horgs hes got to do with marryin’, but dat’s what de
aixpectashuns ob dis horg-pen remin’s me ob ennyway—’bout de time I was
kotin’ Unk Peter’s widder, way back in fifty-fo’,” he added
reflectively, “an’ de hard time I had gettin’ enny konsolashun from dat
ar ’oman. I tell you, suh, it ain’t easy to git enny konsolashun from er
widder—not nigh es easy es it am frum er gal. Huh!” he ejaculated,
derisively. “Folks say it am an’ dat all widders jes’ watchin’ out fur
er chance to git marrid ergin, but you jes’ try onct to git er widder to
say ‘yas’—she’ll jes’ play erroun’ an’ play erroun’ de hook, and fus’
thing you know she’s off, an’ dar you looks an lo!—dun swallered de bait
yo’se’f,” he said.

“Befo’ my wife died,” said the old man, as he ran his thumb down his
hatchet-blade, “I uster think I’d nuvver wanter git marrid enny mo’, an’
I had de mos’ dispizerble contemplashuns fur dese ole fools dat go
rippin’ erroun’, dyein’ dey ha’r an’ writin’ poltry to de moon befo’ dey
fus’ wife’s feet git cold good! Hit’s all right fur er young man to do
dat—he jes’ nacherly jucy an’ he can’t help hisself. But dese ole fools
whut de hot sun ob matremony dun dried up, an’ de trials of
chillun-raisin’ dun tuck de foolishnes’ outen ’em an’ monkey-shines ob
mudder-in-law dun kill ’em in de home-stretch—I tell you, suh, when I
see such men as dese, dat has passed fur forty-odd years as sober,
senserbul men in de kommunity whar dey libs, all at onct begin to git
gay an’ boyish ergin, er snortin’ in evally an’ er clothin’ dey neck wid
thunder, an’ er hollerin’ kerhonk, kerhonk, kerhonk to de captins, an’
de shoutin’, an’ er gwine ’round wantin’ to fight de man-in-de-moon
’kase he happen to peep into dey lady-lub’s winder, it jes’ makes me
wanter go ’round de barn an’ hug sum ole gray mule fur konsolashun!

“Wheneber er ole man’s lub begins to take on er secon’ growth, it am den
dat de anguls in heaben prepares to shed dey tears. Why, suh, I’ve seed
ole fellers hab rumertisn an’ hart-failure so bad dey cudn’t creep to
dey fus’ wife’s fun’ral, but de naixt time I’d see ’em, Gord bless you
soul, honey, dey be runnin’ erroun’ at sum pickernick, fetchin’ water
frum de spring ebery five minutes fur sum sixteen-year-ole gal, cuttin’
watermillions fur her, an’ tryin’ to meander off in de shady woods and
pull up all de hart’s-ease dat grows in er ten-acre woods lot! De
rumertizn all gohn, ter-be-sho’, and de hart-failure dun turned into
head failure, bless de Lawd.

“Dat’s whut I thout, suh,” he continued, “but bless yo’ soul, honey, my
wife hadn’t bin dead er week befo’ I got up one mornin’ an’ all
onbeknownst to myself I foun’ myself blackin’ my shoes! Cudn’t hep it to
sabe my life, suh—jes’ had to do it. De naixt day, suh, ’tirely
unbeknownst to de state ob my naturality, I kotch myself in de act ob
puttin’ h’ar-oil on my hair, cinnermun-draps on my handkerchief, an’
pullin’ off de eel-skin gyarters I dun bin wearin’ forty years fur de
rumertizn. No mo’ rumertiz fur me; er man nurver hes rumertizn arter his
wife dies—least-wise,” he whispered, knowingly, “not twell he marries
erggin an’ den he hes it so bad he can’t cut stove-wood fur her,” he
laughed.

“In er week diszeese tuck me so komplementry, boss, I ’gun ter roach up
de ole muel, fix up de buggy, an’ whitewash de cabin. Dese am allers de
fus’ simptums, suh. I’ve knowed sum ole fellers to make dey house go
widout paint fur forty years, but jes’ es soon es dey wife dies, jes’
watch ’em an’ see ef de fus’ thing dey don’t do am to paint up dat ole
house lak dey tryin’ to ketch er angul—huh! better had er painted it er
leetle fur de fus’ po angul arter dey fooled her into it!

“But de simptums come on me, suh, thick an’ fast, an’ fore goodness,
suh, by Sunday I had it so bad it broke out in spots all ober me, wid
gradual risin’ ob de temperchewin’ dryness in de region ob de salvashun
glands, an’ complete p’ralersis ob de pizzerrinctum ob de sense-bumps!
Gord, boss, I was mighty nigh insenserbul!

“It all seemed lak er dream to me, an’ I can’t tell ’zactly whut I did
do. I seemed ter be walkin’ in er gyarden whar golden roses bloomed on
peppermint candy vines, an’ coon-dorgs wid diamon’ eyes wuz treein’
solid silver ’possums up in de ’simmon trees!

“I tell you, boss, I wanted to marry! An’ de fus’ thing I knowed, me an’
dat ole muel was gwine in a peert trot up de road t’words de cabin ob
Sister Calline Jones, Unk Peter Jones’ widder. I felt sorter mean, an’ I
disremember sayin’ to myself: ‘Heah, you go, Wash, arter all yore good
revolushuns, de biggest fool in de ban’ waggin.’ As I rid off, I seed
dat old mischeevus Mistis ob mine, Miss Charlotte, God bless her!—an’
she called out to me kinder mad-lak, an’ sed: ‘Unkle Wash, I think it’s
a shame you ain’t put on moanin’ for Aunt Peggy.’ The way you are
dressed, ennybody’d think you are gwine to er ball!’

“‘Lor’ bless your sweet soul, Miss Charlotte,’ sez I, ‘don’t hab ter put
on moanin’ lak de white folks; it am already dar, an’ mo’ dan skin deep,
too,’ I sez. ‘I bin moanin’ for Peggy eber sense I marrid ’er,’ I sed,
‘an’ now is my time for rejicement, Miss Charlotte, an’ I gwineter
rejice. Sides dat,’ I sed, ‘whilst I’m moanin’, all my things gwine to
rack, an’ de chillun’s got nobody to take keer ob ’em an’ sumpin’ nuther
sho’ gwinter happen, Miss Charlotte.’

“Miss Charlotte bleege to laf, an’ old Marster he spoke up an’ say, ‘Let
’im erlone, Charlotte. Can’t you see de ole fool has got it? Go on, you
ole idjut,’ he sed to me, ‘an’ marry sumbody an’ git back heah termorrer
wid enuf sense in yo’ haid to run er straight furrer fer de fall
plowin’.’ An’ wid dat I lit out.

“Now, Unk Pete an’ me, suh,” he explained, “belong to de same church—de
Candle Light—an’ to de same lodge—de Ainshunt an’ Honorbul Order ob de
Bow-legged Sons of de Black Cat—an’ ’course I ain’ gwi’ marry his widder
now an’ spile sum moral observashun, so I jes’ stopped at his cabin to
git his consent fur me to marry his widder.

“Get his consent?” I asked. “Why how could you get his consent if he was
dead?”

“Who sed he was dead?” said the old darky, quickly. “I nurver sed so; I
sed she was his widder!”

I tried to explain to him that a man couldn’t have a widow unless he
were dead, but this only made him throw back his head and laugh
heartily.

“Wal, wal, wal, white folks got such curious ways of thinkin’. Who’d
urver thout it? You see,” he said very solemnly and impressively, “It
was dis way: Unk Peter wus gittin’ ole, an’ went off contrawise to de
doctrine an’ marrid dis young ’oman. Furst thing he know, he waked up
sum mohnin’ an’ find hisself de father ob ten chilouns, sum ob ’em hisn
an’ sum ob ’em hern, by her fus’ husban’, an’ dar he wus gittin’ so ole
he cudn’t s’port ’em. So up he jumps an’ at de naixt meetin’ ob de
church he runs fer de offis ob Patriark ob Santerfercashun, which,
’kordin’ to de doctrine ob Hollerness, marrid ’im to de church. ’Course
arter Unk Pete gits santerfercashun an’ marrid to de church, he cudn’t
hab enny uder wife, so he hafter put Sis Calline an’ de chilluns aside,
which made all ob dem de widders ob de church. Don’t you ketch on to de
doctrine, suh?”

I told him I had caught.

The old man was silent as if in deep thought. Then he said: “I wus young
den, an’ bleeved eberything erbout de church an’ de doctrine I eber
heurd, smelt or dreamed, but I am older now, an’ I’ve cum to de pinted
konklushun dat when er man or er woman gets santerfercashun; one or two
things done happen to ’em: Either de flahs ob youth dun played out in de
bilers ob dar natral swashun—de ole Adam in ’em jes’ peg out from ole
aige—or else dey am layin’ low, Brer ’Possum, fur de slickes’ game dat
eber wus played. I’ve kinder notis’d we all nacherly gits better es we
gits older, ennyway, an’ when we gits so ole we can’t sin no mo’, we
mighty nigh good-fur-nuffin’. An’ dars whar de patr’arks ob ole had it
on to de res’ ob us,” said the old man knowingly. “Jes’ let de good
Marster let me lib heah erbout seben hundred years longer, an’ jes’
watch me sot back an’ view unconserned de fleetin’ vanerties ob dis
life.

“Brer Peter wus in deep prayer when I rid up to his cabin, an’ arter he
ris up from his knees he blessed on de top ob my observashun, gib me de
grip ob Ainshunt an’ Honorbul Order ob de Bow-legged Sons ob de Black
Cat, an’ ’lowed he’d lak ter tak off my sandals an’ wash my feet; but I
tole ’im I jes’ wash ’em ’bout er month befo’ an’ didn’t hab no time fur
foolishness; dat I cum to dis cabin fur konsolashun an’ den I jus’ got
offen dat muel an’ plowed a straight furrer ob facts down de row ob his
head: ‘Brer Peter,’ sez I, ‘de doctrine ob our church teach us it am not
good fur er man wid er dozen chilluns to lib erlone on one side ob er
plantashun, an’ er nice, seekin’ lookin’ widder ’oman wid ten mo’ to lib
erlone on de yudder side. In union dar am strength, in numbers dar am
prosperity, an’ in Duteromety dar am happiness. Brer Peter, I wants ter
marry Sister Calline,’ sez I. ‘She am yo’ widder an’ de widder ob de
church, but you know yourself she ain’t had no sho’ ’tall—jes’ ha’f a
marrid life an’ er house full ob chilluns—ten ob ’em, all needin’ sum
lubbin’ father’s gidin’ arm, wid er hickory attachment, whilst my twelve
or fifteen all need de spirtool ker ob er good muther ercompament. De
cotton pickin’ seezen am ’most on us, an’ if I kin jine our forces I’ll
hab er lead-pipe cinch on de cotton crap ob Tennessee to say nuthin’
’bout de fo’teenth ’mendment to de skule law fixin’ de pro ratter ob all
householders raisin’ twenty or mo’ widin de skule aige.

“I tell you, suh, Brer Peter tuck the thing mighty hard, mighty hard. He
didn’t wanter do dat thing ’tall. But arter he dun prayed ober it, he
cum out wid er new light in his eye, an’ he put his hand on my head an’
bless me an’ say, ‘Brer Washington, I’ve prayed ober it. It am de will
ob de Lord. Lite on dat muel an’ seek your konsolashun. Go in an’
receive de sanshun ob her reten-shun an’ de kompliment ob her adorin’.’
And he kinder wink his off eye an’ sed, ‘Go in an’ win, fur you am de
Samson ob lub fightin’ de Phillustines ob matrermony; but when you cum
to git konsolashun from er widder’—an’ dar he wink hes eye ergin—‘use de
same weepun dat Samson used an’ victory am yourn.’

“But when I got to de widder’s cabin an’ tole her—great Scott, suh! she
tuck it terribul hard. She didn’t wan’ marry ’tall. Leastwise she made
me b’leeve it. Hit’s jes’ es I tole you, suh; you hafter wrastle might
swift fur konsolashun when you goes to marry a widder.

“‘Brer Washington,’ she sez, ‘dis am so suddent, so suddent! Don’t you
think you’d be satisfied ef I’d continue in de sisterly relashuns ob de
church wid you?’

“‘Sister Calline,’ sez I, sorter detarmined lak, ‘I’ve had ten ebry day
sisters all my life en sum seben hundred Sunday ones. What I now wants
am one wife!’

“Oh, I tell you, suh, you gotter shoot mighty klose fur konsolashun when
you wants ter marry a widder!

“We kept it up for hours, she argyfyin’ an’ me argyfyin’, she prayin’
an’ me prayin’. I tell you, Boss, she wus er speedy filly, an’ she had
no noshun ob quittin’. We went round de fus’ quarter ob de last mile
nose and nose—argyment ergin argyment, prayer ergin prayer. I thout sho’
she had me distanced onct when she fotch out de scriptures on me an’
turned to de twenty-second chapter ob Exerdust an’ sed: ‘Brer
Washington, read fur yo’self: “Thou shalt not afflict any widder or
fatherless chile.”’ But I turned over to Timerthy, de fifth chapter an’
de third verse, an’ sez I, ‘Sister Calline, whut you read am Ole
Testament. It am anshunt histery. Heah am de New Testament, heah am de
new doctrine: “Honor widders dat am widders, indeed.”’ Oh, I tell you,
Boss,” laughed the old man, “I sho’ hung onto de sulky wheels ob her
contenshun wid de wings ob my orthorteries—you gotter hab sum speed lef’
fur de home stretch ef you wants ter beat er widder home!

“An’ so we went, ’round an’ ’round, wheel ergin wheel, an both drivin’
fur life, she quotin’ scriptures and argyfyin’ an’ me comin’ back wid
Numbers an’ Duterrumetics—an’ sumtimes things dat wus Reverlashuns to
her! At de half I got her tired, at de three-quarters she quit an’ jes’
befo’ she got to de wire she gib up wid er tired, tangled break, an’
sed:

“Brer Washington, it am de Lord’s will.”

“Oh, I tell you, suh, you got er use a mighty keen switch ob beseechment
in de race ef you wanter lead er widder down de home stretch!

“But goodness grashus!” he said, as if suddenly remembering something.
“I’d better be buildin’ dis pen or we won’t hab enny sawseges fur
Kristmus,” and he began to saw energetically.

“Hold on,” I said, “You never told me whether you married the widow or
not.”

He looked at me in undisguised astonishment—“Law, law, law,” he said,
“white folks got such curis ideas. In course I did—marrid her dat night
an’ tuck ’er home de naixt day; ain’t I bin tellin’ you whut er hard
time I had gettin’ konsolashun frum dat ar ’oman?”

He sawed vigorously away for awhile, but I could see he wished to tell
something else. Finally I said:

“Well, go on, I’m waiting.”

He turned around quickly, laid down his saw, laughed, and said: “How de
wurl did you know dar was ennything else? Bless my life, suh, but de
very look ob er white man am er search warrant to de nigger’s soul. Ef
you bleegter hab it, heah it am,” he said, as he looked slyly around: “I
hadn’t been married to dat ’oman but two years befo’ I had to run fur er
offis, too.

“What office?” I asked.

He grinned sheepishly.

“Patriark ob de Santerfercashun,” he said, “I beat Unk Peter fur dat
offis, an’ got eben wid ’im at his own game.

“Lemme tell you, chile,” he added, impressively, “two years ob
konsolashun frum er widder will make a dead man or a Patriark outen
’most ennybody,” and he resumed his sawing with a vigor.

[Illustration]




                         Concerning Littleness


_Let not the littleness of people disturb you. Remember that if you have
been made big enough to do big things in life, you have been made large
enough to overlook little things. So do not imagine you are great, so
long as by sifting yourself you find jealousy, hatred, malice or even
the spirit which frets, in your heart. These and Greatness sleep not in
the same soul._

                                                    JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE.

[Illustration]




                          Stories of the Soil
 The Little Things of Life, Happening All Over the World and Caught in
                      Ink for Trotwood’s Monthly.


He was a fine-looking old gentleman, well-dressed and had the air of a
well-to-do business man. A silver-white mustache set off his
cheery-looking, full, round face, and something in his eyes told me he
wasn’t at all struck on formality and would not mind talking to a
stranger, to pass away an hour or two in a sleeping-car. [Sidenote: An
Unfinished Race.] I noticed, too, that his left sleeve had no arm in it,
and then that he had on a G. A. R. button.

“That old fellow is all right,” I said to myself, “and I’ll bet he left
that arm down in Tennessee. There are a dozen good yarns tucked away
under that derby hat that have never yet seen the color of white paper,
and I am going to get one of them. I should say that he fought from
Shiloh to Chickamauga and from Chattanooga to Nashville, and made a good
one, too, or else he wouldn’t have left that arm in the enemy’s
country.” “He fought the war out,” I said, after I had studied his
countenance more closely and noticed the big bump of benignity that made
up his back head and ended in kind, mild countenance; “and after it was
over he let it stay over, forgot all its meanness, inhumanity and
cussedness generally, came on up here to Indiana and went into business,
attended strictly to it, and is now a well-to-do business man.”

Satisfied that my diagnosis was correct, I went over, and taking a seat
by him, began to slyly get in my net for the fish I knew was there.

“From Middle Tennessee, you say?” he said after awhile. “Well, I guess I
know every foot of it, nearly.” He laughed. “Under a little black locust
tree near Murfreesboro is what is left of this,” he said, as he touched
his empty coat sleeve. “I have often wanted to go back there and see
some of those pretty farms and good horses and bluegrass hills when I
didn’t have any guard duty to do and wasn’t looking for an enemy, but
friends.”

I cordially invited him to come, and mentioned how many of the veterans
come down every now and then to go over the battlefields of the South.

“Is that long, wooden, covered bridge still spanning Duck River at
Columbia?” he asked quickly, as if suddenly remembering all about it.
“That old bridge has got a history,” he continued. “I was with Buell
when we got orders that we were to unite our army with Grant’s somewhere
in the neighborhood of Pittsburg Landing, on the Tennessee. When we
reached Columbia the river was up and the bridge was partially
destroyed, and all the flooring burned. I was one of the engineers and
had to repair the bridge. Word had come that we were needed badly, and
we worked day and night. Then word came that we were needed worse, and
by hard dint I got the army over, and on we rushed for Pittsburg
Landing. We got there almost too late. Grant’s army was nearly ruined.
Johnston had driven it from Shiloh Church to the river bank, a distance
of five or six miles, and only our arrival that night, bringing in the
thirty or thirty-five thousand of Buell’s army, saved Grant. On what
small things do great destinies hang!” he mused. “A loss of a day at
Columbia would have changed the history of this country, and General
Grant, instead of having been President, would have been one more of our
unsuccessful generals.

“But the funniest experience I had in Tennessee was at a little place in
Marshall County, almost at the extreme edge of our army’s position. It
was after the battle of Shiloh, when the main army was at Nashville and
our outposts went as far south as Pulaski. Do you all still raise pacing
horses down there?”

I looked around to see if anybody was near enough to understand the
humor of such a question, but seeing none, and no sign of a joke on the
old gentleman’s face, I kept my face straight as I answered him that we
still raised a few.

“I was always fond of a good saddle horse,” he went on, “and many of the
boys in our company of cavalry were of the same way of thinking. In
fact, we had picked up a whole company of them down there, and I’m
afraid we did not take the trouble to issue any Government warrants for
them either,” he laughed. “So when we went into camp in this village of
Marshall County we had a company of as fine horses as any cavalry
company ever bestrode. Time went a little heavy on our hands, until one
day some of the boys got up a bet on the speed of their respective
horses, and a quarter race was run that evening at which the entire
company turned out. It was won by a little roan horse that could pace
nearly as fast as he could run, which was saying a good deal, for he
could run for a quarter of a mile about as fast as anything I ever saw
on four legs. Well, he won, and two days afterward beat two others, and
a week after that beat everything they could rake and scrape up against
him. All this was hugely interesting and immensely exciting, and as none
of us had ever heard anything of the presence of the rebel cavalry
leader and reckless raider, General Forrest, and never dreamed of the
danger we were in, I am sorry to say that we were more interested in
horse-racing just then than anything else. The owner of the horse called
the little roan pacer and runner “Mack,” in honor of General MacPherson,
who commanded some of us at Shiloh. Well, after Mack had beaten
everything running, it was announced in camp one day that Mack’s match
at pacing had been captured a few days before, and a big pacing race was
to come off that evening to decide it. I had never seen a pacing race
under saddle, and with all the others I went out to see it. You can
imagine what asses we were when we left everything in camp, even our
side arms, in care of a few sentinels and camp followers, and all of us
adjourned to an old field about a quarter of a mile to see the sport.
The track was a half-mile, laid off on a nice country road, the judges
standing at the end of the half mile and the start was at the beginning.
It is needless to say that every man in the company was at the end of
the track where the judges were. The horses were nearly equal favorites,
and we soon had to appoint a man to hold the bets. He had his hands
full, for every man in the company had something upon the race, and the
goose hung high—and we were the goose,” he laughed.

“There were to be three heats. An Indiana man rode Mack, and an Ohio man
rode the other horse. Down the lane they came on the first heat, and all
of us strained our necks to see who led. In forty yards of the wire, so
to speak, Mack lost his head, concluded he was born for running and not
for pacing, broke out and ran away from his man. The judges gave the
heat to the other horse. This made Mack’s friends mad, and after a good
deal of palavering the heat was declared off and everything started
over. In this heat Mack got down to business and beat the other horse by
the nose. But in the next heat the other horse turned the tables on Mack
and beat him a good length. I’ve seen a good many harness races in my
day since then,” continued the old soldier, “but I never saw one that
interested me as much as that. Everything was excitement, and the boys
were betting everything they had, from hardtacks to dollars. When they
turned up the road to come down for the third heat, we could easily see
them from where we were, as the beginning of the track was slightly
elevated. They turned ’round to come, when all at once I saw both horses
stop, their riders looking intently toward the camp, which was behind us
and could be seen by them from their slight elevation. In another
instant they started, but not our way. They gave one wild shout, bolted
the fence on the side of the road and lit out across the fields,
according to our notion, like two fools. Before we had time to imagine
what was up, we heard some shouts and shots in camp, some wild galloping
and yells our way, and we turned ’round only to rush into the arms of a
detachment, some five-hundred strong, of Forrest’s Cavalry. If there
ever were a cheap set, we were the boys. We made no bones of
surrendering, for we hadn’t a dog’s show and were glad to get off with
our clothes.

“‘What in h—— are you Yanks doin’ down here, anyway?’ asked their
leader, a big fellow with a Colonel’s gray uniform on. When the
situation was explained to him he laughed like a big schoolboy. ‘Where
is the stakeholder?’ he asked. When this gentleman was pointed out he
hollered out: ‘Fetch them stakes over here, sonny, and tell the judges
all bets are declared off on this race’! And the way the Johnnies
laughed racked us more than being captured.

“We soon learned the secret of the thing. Forrest had made one of his
characteristic raids around Nashville, captured and burned our stores at
Gallatin and Murfreesboro, and was sweeping on towards Bragg’s army at
Tullahoma. In his sweep he simply scooped us up while we were down in
the woods of Marshall County, running a pumpkin fair, a goose show and a
pacing meeting. But he was in a big hurry himself, for nearly all of
Buell’s cavalry were after him. He had no time to do anything but take
all we had, including our horses, the gate receipts and the book money
and parole us and push on. But he never got Mack and the other horse,
and to this day I have always wished that he had waited five minutes
longer. I’d give ten dollars now,” he added, “to know whether Mack or
the other horse would have won that last heat. But we never knew, for we
were soon forced to the front again; forgot all about our paroles, for
we never did think we were fairly captured, and I never saw Mack or his
rider again. I stayed the war out, but I never went to see any more
pacing races in the enemy’s country,” he laughed.

“Well, come down this fall and see some in the country of friends,” I
said. We shook hands and parted.

                                                               TROTWOOD.

                  *       *       *       *       *

The poem below goes the rounds of the press every year signed with the
name of Gen. Albert Pike. In fact, such is the general belief, and all
the books in which I have seen this poem printed fall into this error.
[Sidenote: The Old Canoe.] But though General Pike wrote some very
beautiful poems, he did not write this one. We have his own admission
made to Senator Carmack, the distinguished senior Senator from
Tennessee. Like many other good poems, it was, perhaps, the only one
some poet wrote, and, never thinking it would be immortal, or that it
had any special merit, failed to sign his name to it.

It is a little curious how this poem became identified with General
Pike. But we learn how it was from an old citizen of Columbia, Tenn.,
who knew General Pike when he was a young man and lived here. Pike
practiced law there when he first started out in life, but met with poor
success. Becoming despondent, he one night paid his hotel bill, went to
the river’s edge, got into an old canoe, and drifted down to
Williamsport, where he took the stage for Nashville. From there he went
West, where he became a successful lawyer and politician, and afterwards
wrote a volume of poetry. Those poems in which he allowed himself to be
natural, such as “Every Year” and others, are very beautiful. But in his
most pretentious poem he seems to imitate Keats and Shelley, and so lost
his own individuality.

After many years Pike came back to Columbia, a celebrated man. He was an
ardent Whig, and made a big speech in support of his principles. To
offset his influence some ardent Democrat composed a doggerel called
“The Old Canoe,” in which it was plainly intimated that Pike had left
here years before between two suns, and had not been too particular
about taking some one else’s canoe to get away in. This doggerel was
sung around the streets until General Pike and his friends were
exasperated beyond measure, ending in the sensitive poet’s leaving the
town. Of course, it was all a lie, and the old canoe was probably the
property of no man, but it seems that then, as now, nothing was too mean
for one political party to say of another. This beautiful poem, “The Old
Canoe,” coming out about that time, was attributed to General Pike, and
its authorship has never before, perhaps, been publicly corrected. It is
found in the schoolbooks, and in books on elocution, as being by General
Pike, but Senator Carmack is our authority that General Pike himself
told him he did not write it.

          Where the rocks are gray and the shore is steep,
          And the waters below look dark and deep,
          Where the rugged pine, in its lonely pride,
          Leans gloomily over the murky tide,
          Where the reeds and rushes are long and rank,
          And the moss grows thick on the winding bank,
          Where the shadow is heavy the whole day through,
          There lies at its moorings the old canoe.

          The useless paddles are idly dropped,
          Like a seabird’s wings that the storm has lopped,
          And crossed on the railing one o’er one
          Like the folded hands when the work is done.
          While busily back and forth between
          The spider stretches his silvery sheen
          And the solemn owl, with his dull “too-hoo”
          Settles down on the side of the old canoe.

          The stern half-sunk in the slimy wave
          Rots slowly away in its living grave,
          And the green moss creeps o’er its dull decay,
          Hiding its moldering dust away.
          Like the hand that plants o’er the tomb a flower
          Or the ivy that mantles the falling tower;
          While many a blossom of loveliest hue
          Springs up o’er the stern of the old canoe.

          The current-less waters are dead and still,
          But the light wind plays with the boat at will;
          And lazily in and out again
          It floats the length of the rusty chain.
          Like the weary march of the hands of time,
          That meet and part at the noontide chime;
          And the shore is kissed at each turning anew,
          By the dripping bow of the old canoe.

          Oh, many a time, with a careless hand,
          I have pushed it away from the pebbly strand,
          And paddled it down where the stream runs quick,
          Where the whirls are wild and the eddies are thick,
          And laughed as I leaned o’er the rocking side,
          And looked below in the broken tide,
          To see that the faces and boats were two,
          That were mirrored back from the old canoe.

          But now, as I lean o’er the crumbling side,
          And look below in the sluggish tide,
          The face that I see there is graver grown,
          And the laugh that I hear has a soberer tone,
          And the hands that lent to the light skiff wings
          Have grown familiar with sterner things.
          But I love to think of the hours that sped
          As I rocked where the whirls their white spray shed,
          Ere the blossoms waved, or the green grass grew
          O’er the moldering stern of the old canoe.

                  *       *       *       *       *

The mule is such an ungainly animal that very few ladies are given over
to admiring him. As for me, I’d rather see an old mule coming my way
when I have the blues, than to see a long absent friend.

[Sidenote: A Mule and a Proposal.]

I know that is a broad assertion, but when you hear the why, I know you
will agree with me, and say as did a little negro, that “one end of him
was good.”

When a little girl, I lived with my people on a handsome farm three
miles distant to the church we attended.

Charley, my dear lord and master, lived only a mile from the church. You
see, Charley was the most bashful man around the neighborhood, and while
everyone knew ages before he proposed, that he loved me, it begun to
look as though he would never gather courage enough to say so.

Night after night he would call, and invariably told me “I was looking
kind of pretty,” and after a dreadful silence, he would break out
suddenly, “I’m kind o’ stuck on you,” giving me such a start that I
would nearly jump out of my chair.

Beyond that “I’m kind o’ stuck on you,” it seemed he would never get,
and at last, growing desperate, one night I determined to use a little
strategy and screw his courage to the sticking point. So when he came,
and discoursed a short time on the weather, the brightness of the moon,
our sick neighbors and such like, I knew my time was near, and awaited
nervously for the never-failing sentence, “I’m kind o’ stuck on you,”
when I expected to say, “Oh, Charles, this is so sudden. I only thought
you liked me as a friend.” This I felt sure would do the work.

At last, clearing his throat, Charles made ready. Looking lovingly at
me, he said, “May, I’m kind o’ stuck on you,” and before the blush had
fairly mantled my cheeks, aye, before I had a chance to utter a sound,
the mean thing went on, “Oh, May, I forgot to tell you, we have a new
colt.”

Never in my life did I feel more like strangling a man than I did that
night. I had to turn aside to hide my tears of disappointment, for you
must know that I really loved the dear fellow. He was not the least bit
bashful with men, or even in the presence of old women. But when it came
to girls, his conversation above speaks volumes.

One Sunday Charley had asked me if I would allow him to drive me home
from church the following Sabbath. I was only too willing to say yes,
hoping that something would happen to make him utter the much-desired
words. Oh, girls, you can better imagine my disappointment than I can
describe it, when late Saturday afternoon my mother’s maiden sister
arrived, bag and baggage. I did not need to be told that I should be
left at home next morning, as the carriage would not accommodate all.

I could not eat any supper and later brother Tom found me lying in my
favorite nook in the summer house, sobbing as though my heart would
break.

Little by little he coaxed me into telling him the reason for my grief,
and at last I told him of my promise to Charley.

He sat and thought for a long time, and then breaking out into a happy
laugh, he cried: “I have it, little Sis. When the others are gone, I’ll
saddle old Bob, and you can ride behind me until we get near the church,
when we can get down and tie Bob in the woods and walk the rest of the
way.”

I felt many misgivings, I can tell you, about riding that mule, but as
this was the only chance of getting to church, I reluctantly assented.
Accordingly, when the carriage drove down the driveway the next morning,
I flew to my room to dress, while Tom went out to saddle Bob. We were
soon ready, and with Tom’s assistance I mounted behind him. The first
two miles were soon covered, and feeling uncomfortable from the jolting
I was getting, I begged Tom to get off and walk the rest of the way.

All at once Tom uttered a yell like a Comanche Indian, and never in the
history of the world did a mule make better time than Bob did, getting
nearer and nearer to church at each leap.

How I begged Tom to stop him and let me get off. But never a whit did
Bob slacken his speed, and I thought I would faint with horror as the
church appeared through the woods.

Faster and faster we came right up to the church door, and that mule
brayed longer and louder than he ever did before.

Down I slid, and back on the home track I started as hard as I could
run. I had not gone far when a horse and buggy came up behind me and a
moment later I was sobbing on Charley’s breast.

He asked me to be his wife that day, and I have long since forgiven the
mule, as he certainly brayed some courage into my Charles. Can you blame
me for being an ardent admirer now of a mule?

                                                   MAMIE TAYLOR GEISSON.

                  *       *       *       *       *

               _Some men are natural born pall-bearers._

[Illustration]




                            Ole Cotton-Tail


            De white man bil’d de big rock fence,
              He’s boss of all de lan’,
            He’s lord of all de fiel’s an’ woods,
              He wuck me all he can.
            He stays up in de big white house,
              Long wid his cake an’ ale,
            He nurver kno’s whut joy it am
              To hunt ole cotton-tail.

            Whut keer I if dat fence am ruint,
              Whut keer I fer de cost?
            Ef I don’t make a hole down dar
              Dat cotton-tail am lost.
            Den I go sneakin’ home ter night
              An’ ketch it, widout fail:
            “Ole man, huccum you sneak in heah
              Widout dat cotton-tail?”

            So watch dar, boy, upon dat fence,
              (You, Juno, watch dat crack!)
            An’ ef you see Marse John come out
              Jes’ drap down in yo’ track.
            I’ll git a stick an’ twist in dar—
              You’ll heah dat rabbit’s wail—
            Whut’s rock an’ stone—dey can’t be e’t,
              Lak good ole cotton-tail.

                                                  OLE WASH.

[Illustration]




                    Historic Highways of the South.
                         THIRD PAPER—NASHVILLE

                         BY JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE


No road is so typical of the Middle Basin as that lying between Franklin
and Nashville. For ten miles it winds around in the lowland basins or
over the intervening ridges, amid fields as fertile as ever yielded
their increase to the husbandman’s plow. On each side the low hill
ranges lie, blue or brown, as the sun happens to fall on them. Fertile
to their very tops are these hills, green in grain or grasses, or darker
green in richer foliage. In this the Middle Basin, through which for
nearly a hundred miles from Nashville to Pulaski, this historic road
runs, the country is different from any in the South. Sea shells lie on
the tops of the hills—sea shells rich in lime and phosphorus. Every foot
of this road is rich in history and tradition. Down it rode Jackson,
time and again, from his home at The Hermitage, not many miles away.
Here, also, rode Polk and Grundy and Sam Houston and Crockett. An old
man told me a story about James K. Polk which I have never seen in
print. He said that in the memorable campaign for the governorship of
Tennessee between James K. Polk and Lean Jimmie Jones, in 1840 (in which
campaign it is said that Jones, who was the greatest stump orator of his
day, and the father of that style of oratory, almost drove the statesman
Polk from the hustings), there was a mutual agreement between the
candidates that Polk should speak at Franklin and Jones at Columbia, in
the wind-up, the day before the election. Columbia was Polk’s home, and
not very solid for him at that. The friends of Polk devised a scheme to
give him the advantage by making two speeches in a day. So he made his
speech early in Franklin and had saddled and ready a thoroughbred horse,
which he mounted after his speech, and galloped to Spring Hill. There he
took a fresh horse and rode furiously to Columbia, arriving in time to
reply to Jones’ speech. But my informant, who was an old line Whig,
informed me that though the future President made record-breaking time
in his race down the pike, he lost in votes when it became known that he
had broken his agreement and played a trick on Lean Jimmie. Jones
defeated him for governor.

But the greatest of all the history made on this pike was made by the
two armies of Hood and Schofield, as they swept over it in the early
days of December, 1864, and then swept back again. The situations were
exactly reversed, making a wave of war which ebbed and flowed, carrying
on its crest the foam of wounds and death and woe. Continuing the story
from Hood’s invasion from our last issue, Schofield’s army reached
Nashville after the battle of Franklin, early in the morning of December
1, 1864, and there united with Thomas. Other detachments had been called
in, including Gen. A. J. Smith, aggregating nearly 12,000 men, and later
Steedman, with 5,200 more. Milroy and Granger, with 8,000 troops, were
ordered to Murfreesboro, and placed under the command of General
Rousseau. According to General Cox (The March to the Sea—Franklin and
Nashville. Jacob D. Cox, page 100), General Thomas had in Nashville on
the morning of November 30, 26,200 men. To these add Schofield’s army of
34,000 men, and it will be seen at a glance what Hood’s disheartened and
stricken army had to fight, and Thomas, a Virginian, in command, with
the bulldog tenacity of Grant and the courage of Hood.

If Franklin had been desperate, what could Hood do now, with the heart
of them dead in his brave men, with sorrow in their hearts for comrades
who slept in trenches under the sod of Franklin, and beloved commanders
who, now being dust, were but a week before pictured forever between the
sky and the bastions of steel as they rode over the breastworks to
death? Even in the heart of the starved and the hardened lives
memory—and what memory must have been theirs in the sleet and cold of
those bitter December nights, while waiting for Thomas to come forth
from his warmth and food to give battle. If Franklin had been a
desperate case, was not this worse—the combined forces of Thomas and
Schofield, Smith and Steedman? Anyone but Hood would have stopped and
thought, but Hood never thought.

“In truth,” says Cox, in the history already quoted, “Hood’s situation
was a very difficult one, and to go forward or to go back was almost
equally unpromising. He followed his natural bent, therefore, which
always favored the appearance, at least, of aggression, and he marched
after Schofield to Nashville.” Hood put Lee’s corps in the center across
the Franklin turnpike; Cheatham took the right, and Stewart the left of
the line, while Forrest, with his cavalry, occupied the country between
Stewart and the river below Nashville.”

[Illustration:

  General Van Dorn’s headquarters, near Spring Hill, where General Van
    Dorn was shot to death by one Dr. Peters for an alleged familiarity
    with the latter’s wife. Peters walked friendly into Van Dorn’s
    office, obtained a pass from the General to go through the line,
    shot him, jumped on a horse and escaped to the Federal line.
]

Here, from the first days of December until the 15th, much of the time
in sleet and rain, Hood’s half starved veterans awaited the oncoming of
Thomas’ well fed and well seasoned troops. Such a meeting could scarcely
be termed a battle, however bravely the long, thin lines might hold out,
and however desperately they might fight. Hood grimly made two stands,
but his gray lines, outflanked and outfought, melted away into a
disorganized rush, back through mud and slush and freezing rain to the
Tennessee. And now, back again, over the same highway, rush the two
armies. Truly this historic highway was baptized in blood. The weather
was cold now, sleeting. When it thawed there was slush, and when it
froze, needles of ice for bare and bloody feet. No army since Valley
Forge suffered as did Hood’s brave men. Truly, the men who could follow
Hood back to the Tennessee, in the biting cold and hunger of those days,
in the numbness which knows that all was lost, and the sorrow for those
who marched no more, truly, the stock of that kind who fought it to a
finish, might well survive that their heroic tribe might be given as a
future pledge for the perpetuity of the Republic.

Two things alone saved Hood from annihilation: The lack of real
generalship in his pursuers, who failed to push their advantage to a
finish, and the intrepid genius of Forrest, who covered Hood’s retreat.
Had Johnston got Sherman, had Lee got McClellan in the fix Hood was now
in, the map of the Union would be painted to-day in two colors.

Of Forrest’s skill in saving Hood’s army, General Cox pays tribute in
the following paragraph, when he says: “At Columbia, Forrest rejoined
Hood, and his cavalry, with an infantry rear guard, under command of
General Walthall, covered the retreat to the Tennessee.... This force
was able to present so strong a front that ... our advance guard was not
able to break through.” But the freezing, pitiless retreat of a brave,
broken army, who had gone into this Pike of Battles fit to fight for a
kingdom, who had done more than any similar body of men had ever done
before, in facing snow and sleet and hunger and bastions of steel and
the entrenched thousands of a well-fed city’s troops, and now went out
under the fatal inefficiency of him who led them, is one of the great
tragic stories of the Lost Cause.

Forever will this historic highway run between sloping hills and sinking
valleys, from the Basin’s Rim to the Tennessee; forever will it girdle
with protecting arms the swelling glories of its maiden hills. The
sentinel rows of corn land, the massed squadrons of wheat, forever will
follow the line of its march, helmeted in tassle-caps, sheathed in
scabbard sheafs, with meshes of gold and gilt, while from the forts of
its over-towering hills orchards of apples will drop their balls of gold
where once contending cannon hurled theirs of steel. Forever and
forever, a tribute and a lesson to all time that brother no more shall
kill brother in the dawning glory of a new age and a new Union. But
never again will it see the equal of that desperate courage, that
sacrifice for conscience, that valor for home and country as each saw
it, as shown by these two armies which swept north and south in glory
and in gloom.

Trotwood does not like to end anything in gloom and sorrow, and so will
end this sketch of this historical highway with some cavalry yarns he
has picked up from the old survivors of this and other battles.

Several years ago, at a Confederate reunion, he found himself among a
group of interesting talkers—men who had been makers of history in this
great struggle. All of them have now joined their comrades who had gone
before—and right worthily they went, as their life’s record will show.
Among that number was Gen. W. H. Jackson, the owner of Belle Meade, then
the most famous thoroughbred nursery in America. [Sidenote: Some Cavalry
Yarns.] On his left was the State’s chief executive, Governor Turney, or
“Old Pete,” as the big brained and big framed fellow under the slouch
hat was familiarly called by every schoolboy in the State. Other
congenial spirits were around, high in social and political circles,
drawn by the annual reunion of Confederate veterans. Some war yarns had
passed around and General Jackson, who was a brilliant cavalry leader
himself, was explaining how efficient the cavalry service was. The
General himself fought through the war and thought that the best horses
in the world for cavalry purposes were those with a good dash of
thoroughbred in them. Jackson himself rode thoroughbreds all through the
war. So did Fitz-Hugh Lee, of Virginia; John H. Morgan, the famous
raider, and many others.

“I remember the time I longed for one mighty bad,” quietly remarked an
Alabama colonel present, as he knocked the ashes off his cigar and
smiled at the turn the story was taking. “It was around Vicksburg, in
the trenches, and Grant was crowding us day and night. We lived on raw
beef and such dogs as happened to stray out of the city, and were
begrimed, dirty, half starved and homesick. Right next to us in the
trenches was a Tennessee company, whose captain always managed to ride
around on a black thoroughbred horse, as handsome a creature as you ever
saw, and which he kept slick and fat and curried always—though the Lord
only knows where he got his rations from. I watched that fellow and soon
caught onto his game. Every time the Yankees would crowd us pretty
close, and it looked as if we would have to surrender anyhow in the
teeth of such overwhelming numbers, this fellow’s horse would get
frightened and, in spite of all his owner’s endeavors, would break away
with him to the rear. One day the fight got terribly hot, our lines were
cut nearly in two, they swarmed over the breastworks, it was a
hand-to-hand fight. To add to the demoralization, here came this captain
on his black horse, going to the rear by the lines like wild, pulling
like Hercules on his horse’s mouth to stop him, and shouting back as he
flew along:

“‘Gentlemen, I can’t stop him—he is running away!’

“‘Hould on, Captain,’ shouted an Irishman in our line, as he jumped up
and waved his cap at the horse and rider, ‘Hould on! I’ll give you a
thousan’ dollars to tell me where I can get another one of that breed of
horses that you can’t hould when he starts to the rear.’

“The Yankees took the shout of laughter that followed Pat’s exclamation
for the Rebel yell and we got a breathing spell at our end of the line
for a couple of hours.”

[Illustration:

  Nashville and Columbia pike in front of the Cheairs’ place, near
    Spring Hill, where the battle would have been fought had not Hood’s
    plans miscarried.
]

“That reminds me of Sam Watkins,” said a gentleman present. “The same
Sam that wrote that inimitable book on the war called “Company H”—the
best book I ever read on the war, for it came nearer to painting it in
its true, horrible colors than any of them. Sam tells the story as he
went through it, from the standpoint of a common soldier, and the motto
of his volume seems to have been General Sherman’s laconic remark that
“War is hell.” If the young idiots ever get up a notion to fight again,
Sam Watkins’ ‘Company H’ will do more to stop them than anything I know
of. Anyway, just before the Battle of Shiloh Sam found himself mounted
on the stubbornest mule that ever went to war. He would charge Grant’s
whole army when the bugle sounded retreat, and would proceed to fall
precipitately back when there wasn’t an enemy in a hundred miles. On the
first day at Shiloh, when Johnston’s army was rushing over everything
before night, and Buell came, Sam’s mule suddenly decided to retreat—and
retreat he did, much to Sam’s mortification and disgust. As he went back
full tilt he ran over a gun with four horses attached and before he
recovered from the shock of the collision to know which way his rear end
was, Sam tied a rope to his neck and the other end of the rope to the
caisson’s axle, and having mounted again he got the artilleryman to
literally haul his muleship into battle. The fight was nearly over when
they finally got to the front, and, General Johnston being killed,
Beauregard had ordered a cessation of hostilities till morning. But it
suddenly dawned on Sam’s mule that he was expected to charge, and no
sooner was he released than he straightened his neck, and before his
rider could dismount, straightened his tail, brayed once and charged
Grant’s whole army, penned up on the banks of the Tennessee River, and
madder than a gored bull in a fence corner. Sam’s captain didn’t
understand the mule’s maneuvers, and as he went by shouted to his men:

“‘Look at brave Sam Watkins, boys, charging right in the cannon’s
mouth.’

[Illustration:

  The Martin Place, near Spring Hill, Tennessee, one of the finest farms
    in the State, formerly the Gibson Farm, and the first home of Tom
    Hal in Maury County; also historically associated with Hood’s raid.
]

“‘It ain’t me chargin’, Captain,’ shouted poor Sam, as he pulled away
with all his might to keep out of certain death—‘it ain’t me. I ain’t
such a fool as that. It’s this damned old mule! Whoa, Baalam, whoa!’

“I don’t know how that is,” remarked a colonel who had seen hard service
on foot, “but I do know that we infantry fellows had a holy contempt of
all cavalrymen. At the Battle of Murfreesboro I was badly wounded in the
leg and arm, and for days I could scarcely walk. As I was hobbling back
to the rear on the third day after the fight, I met my brother mounted.
As soon as he saw my condition he got down, helped me up on his horse
and told me how to ride out to find the hospital surgeon. Now, in our
brigade, we had a standing reward of a thousand dollars for anybody who
would show us a dead cavalryman. I had forgotten all about this when all
at once I rode into a Texas regiment camping and fixing for supper. My
arm was in a sling, and from my drooping position it was plain I was
wounded. As soon as they saw me one of them yelled out:

“‘Run here, boys, run quick, and see the curiosity of the century. Here
is a wounded cavalryman!’

[Illustration:

  The Lane of the Lost Opportunity, near Spring Hill, Tennessee, where
    Hood came so near cutting off Schofield.
]

“And before I could get on they had surrounded me and proceeded to make
life a greater burden. In vain I tried to explain; as far as I went I
heard only one yell:

“‘Look at the wonder of the century! Here is a real wounded cavalryman.
Sonny, how in the world did you ever get that close to a bullet?’ and so
on. I got off of that horse as soon as I could and never tried to play
cavalry again during the war.”

“I think it pretty well established,” remarked General Jackson, “that
the greatest cavalry leader of the Confederacy was Gen. N. B. Forrest.
His career was a curious one, as illustrating the heights to which a
natural genius, uneducated though it may be, can go in its chosen path.
He had twenty-nine horses, in all, killed under him during the war, and
yet came out unhurt save when a minie ball one day ploughed through his
stirrup and the sole of his boot. After the war, in which he rose to be
a lieutenant-general, his fame as a cavalry leader had spread so far
that during the Franco-Prussian War, Napoleon III sent a distinguished
military tribunal over here to get General Forrest’s mode of fighting
cavalry. On their way to Memphis they stopped over at Belle Meade to
inspect my stud, and as I had seen a good deal of service with Forrest I
was telling them of some of his ways of fighting cavalry. Only one of
them could speak English, and I remember how the other two laughed as I
told their interpreter how Forrest escaped annihilation by pure
audacity, on Hood’s retreat out of Tennessee, of whose army his cavalry
covered the retreat. Forrest’s cavalry was really mounted infantry, and
he had in it also two of the deadliest batteries in the Civil War. On
Hood’s retreat he saved the army by planting his batteries and checking
the Federal advance—then, when they came in overpowering numbers he
would fall back to another natural hill breastwork and check them again,
while Hood was trying to get over Duck River. But one time he came near
being annihilated. He held his ground too long when suddenly an officer
dashed up and shouted:

“‘General! General, we are ruined! The enemy is in our rear. We will
have to surrender! What shall we do?’

“‘Do? Do?’ shouted Forrest, as he cursed the officer for a
chicken-hearted coward. ‘Is that all you know about war? What will I do?
In my rear, are they? Well, I’ll just about face and then I’ll be in
them, won’t I?’ And he did, capturing more prisoners than he could take
into the Tennessee River with him. The French committee were highly
amused, and said such a course would never have been thought of in
European warfare. I afterwards learned that the only information they
got from Forrest on their visit was his now historic answer to their
question as to what was his rule of warfare, to which he answered,
‘There ain’t but one rule—I always tried to git thar fust with the most
men.’ Now, the thoroughbred horse is the best horse in Tennessee to ’git
thar fust’ on,’” laughed the general, “unless it is one of Trotwood’s
pacers,” he said, as he winked my way, “and the only reason they are fit
for anything is because they are built on the best kind of thoroughbred
lines, as he has admitted time and again.”

“I remember a laughable incident on Hood’s retreat at a small creek
between Nashville and Columbia,” said another old soldier present. “It
was early morning, cold and sleety. We had waded the creek, but had to
go back to help pull the artillery over. As we came out of the mud and
water, a long line of us tugging at a gun, a lank, solemn soldier walked
up on the bank, drew himself up with great dignity, and in a sepulchral
voice said: “Fellow citizens!”

Instantly every man stopped and listened for some important
announcement.

“Fellow citizens,” went on the man, in a deep, earnest tone, “aftah much
reflection an’ mature deliberation, I have decided that South Carolina
was a little too hasty.”

He was so solemn and earnest that he was greeted with a big laugh and
shout.

                  *       *       *       *       *

  [Note—Under this heading, in a near issue, will be the illustrated
  story of the Old Nachez Trace and the story of the death of
  Meriwether Lewis.—Ed.]




                          A Famous Horse Race

                         BY BEN MCCULLOCH HORD

  [The incidents in connection with this great race, so graphically
  described by the writer, were given him by an old turfman who at
  that time was a young jockey and witnessed the race.—Ed.]


At the time of which I speak, there were a number of famous horses on
the turf, necessarily producing much rivalry between their various
owners and friends. The most prominent that I can call to memory now
were Boston, Duane, Decatur, Vashti, Balie Peyton, Fannie Wyatt, Charles
Carter, Lady Clifton, Clarion, etc. Boston was just beginning to win the
fame that afterward made his name a household word throughout the racing
world, and nearly all of the best horses of the day sought to measure
strides with this distinguished son of Timoleon. In the language of an
old turfman, they were laying for him. At this time Boston belonged to
Mr. Nat Reeves, of Richmond, Va., and after Decatur had defeated Fannie
Wyatt in a four-mile heat race at Washington, D. C., Mr. James Long, a
great admirer of Boston, and a close friend of Mr. Reeves, proposed to
Captain Heath, the owner of Decatur, to match Boston against him,
four-mile heats, for a purse of $10,000, to be run at Camden, N. J.,
provided that he could get the use of Boston for the race. The match was
accepted and $1,000 forfeit put up. Mr. Long went over to Long Island,
where Mr. Reeves had Boston attending the spring meeting, and made known
his match, which was agreed to. Decatur was at Washington, while Duane
and Charles Carter, both in the same stable, were gathering turf laurels
at other places. Boston had never gone four miles up to this time, and
there were many prominent turfmen who doubted his ability and courage to
negotiate this distance in good company, consequently as soon as the
match between him and Decatur became known it made the latter largely
the choice in the betting, he having recently defeated that good mare,
Fannie Wyatt, in the four-mile race above referred to.

Messrs. Reeves and Long, however, were not slow in finding out Boston’s
courage—they were already satisfied as to his speed—so they gave him a
trial, which was entirely satisfactory, he having defeated in this trial
his stable companion, the celebrated Atlanta, 108 times the length of
Mr. Long’s walking stick, a novel way, certainly, to measure distance,
but it was certainly done in this case, and in those days horses were
tried with horses, and not by the watch, as now.

Just before the match came off, the Boston party concluded not to run,
but to pay forfeit, which they did. Their idea was that they could bet
their money to better advantage in the four-mile purse race, which was
to come off in a day or two, and in which both horses would enter,
knowing that Decatur would be largely the favorite in the betting, and
even more so, as they had paid forfeit to him. On the day of the race
the track was quite heavy. This also lengthened the odds on Decatur. But
Boston won, after a close contest, and largely enriched his friends. He
was now considered the champion racer of America, and he was sent over
to Long Island to attend the second spring meeting, to come off in a few
weeks.

In the meantime Duane and Charles Carter had been winning fame and most
of the large purses in Maryland and Virginia, under the management of
that shrewd and competent horseman, Billy McCargo. They were now turned
toward the metropolis, with a view to catching this new champion at Long
Island and taking a measure of his courage and speed. McCargo thought
either of his horses was better than Decatur, and as good, if not
better, than Boston. At Long Island he decided to make his first battle
on Boston with Charles Carter, the lesser light of the two stars of the
turf. The horses came together in a four-mile purse race, and for the
character of the soil and condition of the track, it was the most
fiercely-contested four-mile dash I ever saw. The first three miles were
run in 5:36, the fastest, notwithstanding the poor condition of the
track, ever made up to that time. As they passed out on the fourth mile
the horses were going like a matched team, and the contest appeared in
great doubt, but on the back side Boston began to draw away and won
easily by half a dozen lengths, and when Carter came in it was seen that
he was broken down and had run his last race.

Boston and his friends now crossed over to Hoboken, followed by McCargo,
with Duane. Over the new race course on Beacon Heights it was decided
that Duane should give the champion a beating or the race of his life.
McCargo had managed his fight on Boston with consummate skill. He had
selected the weaker of his two horses, Charles Carter, to make the first
assault, and it was evident from the terrific fight he had made over the
Long Island track that he hoped, even if he could not win with Carter,
to at least run Boston such a race that he could beat him with Duane on
Beacon Heights. Therefore they were quite sanguine of victory and freely
took all bets offered.

Beacon Heights was a new course just opened near New York, easy of
access, and costing only a trifle to get from the city there and to see
the race. Excitement was intense over the coming race between these two
famous Southern champions, both sons of Virginia, and I am confident
that a hundred thousand people witnessed the race. They came from every
section of the United States, and all classes were represented. Mr. Van
Buren, who was then President, and all of his Cabinet occupied a
conspicuous place in the grandstand, as did also nearly all of the
foreign legations, who were out in full force. The beauty and chivalry
of the nation had assembled to witness what was expected and what proved
to be the greatest horse race that ever occurred in this or any other
country. The great sea of humanity was kept in the best of humor by
lively music from a number of bands, the most noted being the United
States Marine Band, which had been sent out in honor of the assembled
dignitaries.

In those days there was but little betting done until the day of the
race, and most generally not until the horses were on the track. On this
occasion Commodore Stockdon, who, besides being a Commodore in our navy
was also a true sportsman and a prominent breeder and importer of
thoroughbreds, and who owned and raced some prominent horses of the day,
proposed on the evening before the race to Mr. Pringle, the most noted
sporting man of that day, in Washington, that he would bet him $5,000 on
Duane, provided he liked the looks of the horse the next day. The bet
was promptly taken, and the next day when the horses were brought out,
after carefully inspecting Duane, the Commodore told Pringle it was “a
go.” This settled it. No money passed, and rarely ever did with big
bettors. In those days men’s words were sufficient. What a striking
difference between then and now! Here a Commodore in the navy bets
$5,000 with a noted gambler, with nothing more than the word “go”
between them, and yet either would have sold the clothes off his back
rather than to crawfish out of the bet, or in any way defraud the other.
This even bet seemed to make the mark for others to go by, and the money
went on even up, and by the cartload in sums from fifty to five and ten
thousand dollars a side. As a rule the Southern contingent backed Duane,
while the New Yorkers piled their wealth on Boston. McCargo’s mulatto
boy, Steve, who had ridden Carter against Boston, at Long Island, was
now up on Duane to make another desperate effort to down the champion,
while Cornelius, Boston’s old rider, a negro boy who belonged to Mr.
Reeves, the owner of the horse, was in the pigskin on his favorite.

After having gone through the racing season, running from two to four
mile heat races every week, the two horses, as they stepped out on the
track, looked like two gamecocks made of whalebone and steel. Every
muscle and sinew stood out as if carved by an artist’s chisel, while
their glossy coats, bright eyes and light, springy step indicated that
both were on edge and ready to run for a king’s ransom or a woman’s
love. Boston was a red sorrel, about fifteen hands three inches high,
both hind ankles white and a white strip on his face that broadened out
over the nose; hence the nickname of “Old White Nose” afterward given to
him by his friends. He was a horse of immense driving power, but so very
symmetrical in his proportions and so evenly balanced that it was only
noticeable in the eyes of a critic. As he moved about under Cornelius
quietly, but with a supple, catlike step, bearing lightly on the
snaffle, with his red coat gleaming in the sunshine like burnished gold,
he was as beautiful and grand-looking a specimen of race horse as ever
gladdened the eyes of a turfman. Duane, the son of imported Hedgford,
was the counterpart of Boston in every respect, except in color and
markings. He was a dark brown, almost black, with tan muzzle and flanks.
While Boston’s coat shone like gold, Duane looked like polished bronze.
He had no marks, except a small spot of white in his forehead that shone
like a diamond, and as he was led out on the course by his old negro
trainer, Lazarus, with yellow Steve in the saddle, followed by their
manager, Billy McCargo, they presented a picture that will live forever
in the memory of every turfman who saw them. Gilpatrick, the most
distinguished jockey of his day, afterwards the rider of Boston in all
of his races, and who rode Lexington in his memorable race against time,
and I, both young riders then and fast friends, pooled our hard-earned
wages, amounting to $13, and bet it all on Boston, and with beating
hearts we worked our way through the crowd and took position under the
wire directly opposite the judges. Hon. John C. Stevens, one of New
York’s most prominent citizens, an accomplished gentleman and the most
competent starter of his day, was in the stand and ordered out the
horses.


                              First Heat.

At the tap of the drum the battle began. Duane was first on his stride
and showed the way around the turn. Here Boston made a run and shortly
after entering the stretch was on even terms with him. Head and head
they passed the stand. A mighty shout went up from the vast crowd and as
they started on the second mile you could hear, “$500 on Duane!” “A
$1,000 on Boston!” “Watch him run him out!” “Stay with him, old white
nose!” and a thousand other such exclamations from the friends of each.
Rounding the lower turn, Duane having the track, Cornelius took a slight
pull on Boston, but on entering the back stretch he made a run and at
the half they were nearly lapped. Rounding the upper turn, however,
Duane shook him off. Another shout from the backers of Duane and more
money goes up. Entering the stretch the game son of Timoleon makes
another run at his flying antagonist, and, although he closes up the
space, he can only get on Duane’s hip, and in this order, head and hip,
they pass the stand and swing around the turn. Cornelius is content to
hold this position until he enters the back stretch, when he again calls
on Boston; slowly but surely the red coat of Boston inches up and at the
half is hid behind Duane. So even are they running that it looks like
one horse and one rider; in this position they ran around the upper
turn, down the home stretch and enter the fourth mile as even as a
carriage team with the deafening shouts of the multitude following them.
Rounding the lower turn Steve for the first time takes a pull on Duane,
evidently with a view of saving him for the finish; Cornelius on Boston
moves to the front, intending to take the track, but Steve has no idea
of giving up this advantage, and he keeps Duane moving just close enough
to keep Boston on the outside. In this position they race to the head of
the stretch. Here Steve begins to make a run; down the stretch they
come, hip and head, but in spite of all Cornelius’ efforts and in spite
of the long, tireless strides of Boston, the brown son of Hedgford
overhauls him when half-way down the stretch, but it has taken the last
remnant of his reserve power to do this, and head to head, leap for
leap, they strain their hardened muscles. A child’s blanket would have
covered them. Both riders were rolling in their saddles from exhaustion,
but were lifting and urging all they could. Boston had been running
purely on his courage. Cornelius had neither whip nor spur. Steve had on
spurs that had more than once in the finish drawn the claret from Duane.
“A dead heat!” “A dead heat!” shout the crowd. No. One more stride with
a savage dig that sent the rowels home in the quivering flanks of his
horse and at the same time lifting his head Steve sends Duane under the
wire a winner by a scant head, in 7:52.

Remarkable time for a new track filled with roots and sprouts. Both
horses showed distress when the boys returned to weigh out. It had been
a battle between giants, and their heaving flanks gave evidence of the
great physical strain they had undergone, but the same gamecock look
flashed from their eyes, showing that while the flesh might be weak
their courage could never die. The riders were scarcely less distressed.
Steve, the rider of Duane, fainted when taken down, and Cornelius was in
but little better condition. So popular was the victory of Duane that
Mr. Wm. Friend, of Virginia, bought him before the next heat was called,
paying his owner $12,000 for him.

Although he had lost a heat Boston’s friends asked and received no odds,
but still covered Duane money, even up.


                              Second Heat.

When the horses were called for the second heat they came up looking
well. Both had cooled out admirably. Johnny Hartman, a white jockey, and
one of the best riders on the turf, was upon Duane, Steve not being able
to resume his mount. Up to this time Boston had never been marked by
whip or spur, except in his first race, when he sulked when touched with
a spur. He had won all of his races running purely on his courage. Col.
Wm. R. Johnson, the “Napoleon of the Turf,” who was managing him in this
race, procured a cowhide, and when he mounted Cornelius gave it to him
with instructions to use it if necessary from start to finish. There was
no delay at the post; the drum tapped, and they were off, followed by
the continuous cheers of the crowd. I doubt if a more closely contested
match for four miles was ever run over any course than was waged between
these two great horses in this second heat. It was literally a fight to
the death. With every muscle strained, every sinew drawn to its utmost
tension, they raced head for head the entire distance. Duane was on the
inside and held it to the finish, although Boston made repeated efforts
in every mile to take it. It was drive, drive, drive; death or victory.
First the head of gold striped with white would for a moment show in
front, then the head of bronze with the white spot gleaming like a star
of hope would take the lead, but never more than a scant head would at
any time divide them. As the head of either horse would show in front
their respective friends would give a ringing cheer, but as mile after
mile of the mighty contest was measured off by the long, low, powerful
strides of these great racers and the desperate character of the race
became more and more apparent, the excitement became too intense for
shouting, and as the horses turned into the stretch on the fourth mile
for the run home nose to nose, bit to bit and stride for stride a
stillness as of death came over the crowd. Not a shout, not a word, not
a whisper was heard. The stable boys and rubbers with bated breath and
bulging eyes stared with almost agonized expression on their faces up
the stretch where the desperate battle was being fought. The lemonade
vender gave up all thoughts of trade, and even the wily pickpocket
forgot his calling for the moment, and his hand, still clutching his
ill-gotten gains, trembled with excitement as he watched the flying
stallions and heard the ceaseless patter of their hoof strokes.

I was a young light-weight jockey then who had won his spurs in more
than one hotly-contested field, and to-day am perhaps the only living
turfman who witnessed this great match, for nearly sixty years have
passed since then; yet in memory’s mirror, I can see that fearful finish
as distinctly as my young eyes saw it that day. I can see two horses
half-way down the stretch coming as true and even as two arrows from one
bow. I can see two outstretched necks and heads, a sorrel and a brown, a
blaze and a star. I can see their powerful haunches gathered under them
and drive them forward as if they were shot from the mouth of a cannon.
I can see the hard-trained muscles playing beneath their thin skins like
oiled machinery, and as they come nearer and nearer I see their ears
lying back and their bloodshot eyes gleaming with the light of the
battle and undying courage. I hear their labored breathing and can see
the red flush up their widely-distended nostrils glowing like heated
furnaces. I can see Johnny Hartman, pale as death, riding as if for his
life, drive the merciless steel again and again in the panting sides of
Duane, and at each time the blood spurting from the wounds. I can see
the black face of Cornelius, drawn as if in mortal agony, his lips
parted, his white teeth shining and his eyes fixed on the finishing
point only a few yards away. I can see him swing the cowhide, already
crimsoned with the royal blood of Boston, high over his head and bring
it down on the quivering flank of his horse, then, quick as lightning,
lift him with the bit. I can see the great son of Timoleon crouch lower
to the ground, gather his powerful quarters further under him and make
the final rush just as Cornelius lifts him, and I can see the golden
head and white nose cross the wire in front of the bronze and the star.
Boston wins, but only by a head. Then the pent-up excitement broke
forth. “Boston wins!” “Boston wins!” was the shout. Yes, he had won, but
could he do so again? This was only a heat apiece. Another heat was
necessary to decide the race, and in the peerless brown stallion he had
found a foeman well worthy of his steel, and one that had shown him he
could take his measure in any part of the four miles. Both horses had
been fearfully punished and were dreadfully distressed, and so were the
riders. Of the two latter Hartman was much the freshest, for after
weighing out Cornelius had to be rubbed out, drenched with brandy and
altogether requiring almost as much attention as his horse. But he would
have died in the saddle rather than have relinquished his mount, and
when they were called for the last heat he came out with his bloody
whip, looking as determined as ever.


                              Third Heat.

Gilpatrick and I took our old position under the wire, with many
misgivings as to the fate of our combined fortunes, the $13 that hung
upon the result of this heat. For the first time Boston began to show
the ugly side of his disposition by sulking. As they were led up to
start he repeatedly refused to go, and when the drum was finally tapped,
having the inside, he bolted toward the fence. Cornelius pulled him out,
and then he ran diagonally across the track towards the outside. In the
meantime Hartman was sending the dead game son of Hedgford, along, and
by the time Cornelius got Boston straight and on his stride the
magnificent brown had taken the track and was running smoothly more than
fifty yards in front. These positions were maintained until they reached
the head of the stretch. Here Boston showed another peculiar trait in
his disposition, and one for which he afterwards became noted, the
shouting of a crowd seemed to inspire him and make him run faster. As
they turned into the stretch with Duane so far in advance his friends
began to cheer. The sound no sooner reached Boston’s ears than he began
of his own accord to make a run at Duane, and so rapidly did he run down
the stretch that when they passed under the wire he was only two open
lengths away. Going around the lower turn both riders eased up their
horses, but on entering the back stretch Cornelius made a run with
Boston at Duane and at the half mile had closed out all the daylight
between them.

But rounding the upper turn Duane shook him off and entered the stretch
an open length and a half in front. Again a great shout went up from the
backers of the peerless brown stallion as they saw his move, and again
as the sound reached Boston it seemed to lend him wings. Running true
and straight as a bullet flies, without touch of whip, the whitefaced
son of Timoleon began to devour the space that separated him from his
antagonist, and as they passed the stand at the end of the second mile
his white nose was at Duane’s hip. Going around the lower turn the boys
again took easy pulls on their horses, and in this position they go up
the stretch and around the upper turn, Boston holding his place with the
tenacity of a bull dog. But the white star of Duane is still in front as
they swing into the stretch, and again his backers greet him with a
cheer and again “old white nose” takes the compliment to himself and
promptly, in response, he quickens his stride and again reaches Duane.
Half-way down the stretch he collars him, and as they pass the stand his
white nose is in front for the first time since starting on this last
heat. It was now the time for Boston’s friends to cheer, and if
pandemonium had broken loose more noise could not have been made. Men
were simply wild with excitement. They danced about like children; hats,
coats and canes were thrown into the air. Gilpatrick and I hugged each
other and shouted ourselves hoarse, and, as the horses rounded the lower
turn, the shouting increased, as it was seen that Boston, inspired by
the shouting, no doubt, had kept up his killing stride and had taken the
track from Duane. But to experienced riders like Gil and I this sudden
change in position was rather a source of uneasiness. We both knew
Hartman well. He was every inch a rider and a cool and skillful
horseman, and we could see that he had taken a strong pull on his horse,
saving him for the terrific finish he knew was yet to come. Knowing from
our own experience in the saddle what was coming we paid no attention to
the over-sanguine friends of Boston shouting: “Duane has quit!” “Duane
has quit!” We knew the horse and we knew the rider, and we also knew
that a race for life was coming and our fortunes were on the issue. So
we anxiously watched them as they raced nose and tail, with Boston
leading up the back side and around the upper turn.

Just before entering the stretch for home Hartman began to move on
Duane. “He’s coming!” “He’s coming!” Gil whispered, for he was too
excited to speak, and we both stood speechless watching the fierce
battle that was opening a quarter of a mile away. Cornelius rides Boston
a little wide on turning in the stretch in order that his whip hand
might be free to drive. Hartman sees the opening thus made next the rail
and rushes Duane in it. It was skillful riding on both sides. Hartman
had no whip, but rode with spurs, while Cornelius had no spurs, for
Boston would not stand them, but rode with a whip, and if Hartman in a
tight finish could get so close to Cornelius on his whip side as to
prevent him from using the lash he would have a big advantage. This
Cornelius prevented by riding a little out on the turn. The spurt of
Duane was greeted with the old-time cheer of his backers. “He comes! he
comes!” “See him come!” went up from the throats of thousands, but it
ceased almost as suddenly as it began, for the red horse is coming with
him, and at that moment not a hand’s breadth divides them. But Hartman’s
judgment in saving his horse now begins to tell, and inch by inch the
brown stud begins to slowly but surely draw away. First a nose, then a
head, then a neck and shoulders he pushes to the front. Hartman’s knee
is at Boston’s head. Duane is a half length in front and only an eighth
of a mile to run. Can he hold? Cornelius shifts both reins to his left
hand, the cat-gut whirls above his head and falls upon the flank of
Boston, cutting the thin skin of the thoroughbred like a knife. Maddened
with pain and his own desire to win Boston bites savagely at Duane, but
catches Hartman’s trousers at the knee and nearly tears them off of the
jockey. Cornelius pulls him loose, lifts his head, straightens him and
again the cruel rawhide tastes his blood. Responding to the lash with
unfaltering courage, with the shouts of “Duane,” “Duane,” “Duane wins!”
ringing in his ears, the great horse with almost human instinct seems to
know that the supreme moment has come, as he puts forth the last vital
ounce of strength that yet lingers in his powerful muscles and begins to
draw up on Duane. Each weary leap brings him nearer and nearer the head
of the gallant brown, whose last rush at the head of the stretch is now
beginning to tell upon him. Only fifty feet from the wire and they are
nose and nose. Horses and riders were rolling from side to side, all
utterly exhausted. Still, with outstretched necks, distended nostrils
and eyes yet flaming with passion, the fierce contest goes on as they
literally stagger towards the finish, for the pace is now nothing more
than a hard gallop. Cornelius is reeling from exhaustion in his saddle,
but with a last effort he partially lifts the drooping head of Boston,
cuts him with the whip and—the race is over! Boston wins! But so dead
tired are both horses that Boston, although the winner, actually stopped
directly under the wire, and Duane walked under it.

Fortune has been kind to me since then and given me many of her most
choice blessings, but never in her most liberal moods has she given me
anything that I appreciated more than the smile she gave me that hot day
on Beacon Heights nearly sixty years ago, when, watching this greatest
of all the great races I have ever seen, she doubled my humble fortune.

The reason so little has ever been said or written about this race is
owing to the fact that it was not a match or stake or section race, but
simply a purse race of four mile heats, in which two of the most noted
horses in America met. I helped to carry Boston home after the race. We
went through by land, and so completely exhausted was the horse that he
would frequently fall and we would have to assist him to his feet.




                            With Our Writers


“A merry heart doeth good like a medicine.”

As a rule, traveling salesmen manage to extract and radiate as much joy
and mirth as any class of citizens that I know of. But even these genial
spirits have their own sorrows.

A drummer was sent by his house, shortly after his marriage, on a long
trip to the Pacific coast. Some time after his departure the young wife
was seized with appendicitis, was hurried off to a hospital, operated
on, and recovered all right. The strain, both mental and financial, had
been great, but she was well again. Joe had remitted by check for
surgeon’s fee, special nurse, hospital charges, and a few other items
amounting to a hundred or so, and his spirits were just beginning to
rise again as he worked towards Los Angeles, where mail from home would
await him.

The “gang” from the 9:10 train hurried up to the office of the
“Link-Schmidt.” The night clerk handed each his quota of these
ever-welcome missives.

In the reading room Joe was seen to turn deathly pale. Several at once
approached. “What’s matter, old boy?” “Bad news from home?” “Anything
out of whack?” and kindred interrogatories were fired at him from all
directions.

Some griefs are too poignant for expression. Carefully folding back the
first and last parts of a page, Joe exhibited, without comment, only
this paragraph of its perfumed surface: “I am not feeling as well,
dearest, as when I wrote you at Pasadena. Sallie is coming over
to-morrow and we are going to have our kimonos cut out.”

Reader number one passed it down the line. Silence, that was stifling,
settled over the group. Then, moved by a common impulse, a solemn
procession filed out and lined up before a rosewood counter, in front of
which ran a massive gilt rail. “Martini,” “Black and White High Ball,”
“Wilson,” “Same.” In the land of the high ball a poet once sang:

               “Inspiring, bold John Barleycorn!
               What dangers thou can make us scorn!
               Wi’ tu’penny we fear nae evil;
               Wi’ whiskey straight we’d face the divil.”

It was so in this instance. Joe came to first. “Ain’t that ——” (from the
youngest in the bunch). “Say, Joe, the repair bills of you married men
must be something fierce.”

“Oh, come on, boys, let’s go to supper.”

                                                                H. K. A.


                         Mr. Wallace Mistaken.

 Editor Trotwood’s:

I have read with much interest your history of that remarkable family of
pacers. If the Hal family of pacers can’t produce world’s
record-breaking trotters, the theory that extreme trotting speed comes
from the pacer, or originated from the pacing gait, must go to the wall.

Mr. Wallace was certainly misinformed when he was told that the dam of
Vermont Black Hawk was a pacer. I hunted up the man who had charge of
her for upwards of eight years, and he assured me that the dam of
Vermont Black Hawk was as square gaited a trotter as he ever saw, and
that she never paced a step during all the time she was owned in the
Twombly family. This man was Mr. Shadrak Seavey, a grandson of Ezekiel
Twombly, and men who knew him personally assured me that no man’s
reputation for strict veracity was superior to that of Mr. Seavey.
Horsemen who knew this mare agreed unanimously with Mr. Seavey in
describing her color, size, conformation and gait.

The man who misled Mr. Wallace got on the track of the wrong mare. He
was the same man (Allen W. Thompson, of Woodstock, Vt.) who strenuously
contended that Vermont Black Hawk was by Paddy, and Ethan Allen 2:25½
was by Adams’ Flying Morgan, in spite of the fact that the stud book of
Sherman Morgan showed that the dam of Vermont Black Hawk was mated with
him May 14, 1832, and I learned from Mr. Seavey that Black Hawk was
foaled about the middle of April, 1833.

The stud service book of Vermont Black Hawk shows that the Holcomb mare,
dam of Ethan Allen, was mated with Black Hawk July 9, 1848. It is a
matter of history that Ethan Allen was foaled June 18, 1849. These facts
were known to Thompson, but because Ethan Allen was bay in color,
Thompson was sure there must have been some mistake. He did not succeed
in winning Mr. Wallace on that point, but touched a responsive chord
when he hit upon the pacing mare as the dam of Vermont Black Hawk.

I read your Monthly Sundays, when, I suppose, I should be at church. If
your publication is as great a success financially as in all other
respects, you will have a bank account when you reach my age that will
enable you to live comfortably the remainder of your days. That such may
be the case is my sincere wish.

Pardon me for the length of this epistle. I won’t do it again. Very
truly yours,

                                                           S. W. PARLIN.

 Boston, Mass.


                            As to Football.

 Editor Trotwood’s:

In college and university circles, during the year 1905, one of the
vital questions receiving its share of attention was, as some one has
aptly phrased it, “Is football to be mended or ended?” This and similar
questions open the subject for discussion, in the progress of which a
number of very caustic criticisms have been leveled at the game by the
presidents of some of our great universities and colleges and members of
their respective faculties. The president of Columbia University, the
first to abolish the game, recently declared that football as now played
is no longer a sport, but a profession, and, like other professions,
demands prolonged training, complete absorption of time and thought, and
is inconsistent, in practice, at least, with the devotion to work which
is the first duty of college and university students. He also calls
attention to the “figure” “gate receipts” cuts in the conduct of the
game, which, says he, “marks the game as in no small degree a commercial
enterprise.” President Wheeler of the University of California, brings
his indictment against the promoters of the modern game for “having
changed the gridiron into a multiplication table,” and otherwise
tampering with it, until to-day “American intercollegiate football has
become a spectacle, and not a sport.” The president of the College of
the City of New York reviews the evolution of football, and makes a
strong plea for a return to the game of earlier times, “when football
was rather primitive; few practice hours, few out-of-town games; no
training table; no excuse from regular university work, and the boys led
a normal student life.” However, whatever may be the opinion of certain
scholastic dignitaries, and however incompetent the “rank outsider” may
be to judge the game, a reasonable survey of the situation reveals the
fact that public opinion, the most powerful factor with which we have to
deal, is now concentrating its forces preparatory to “bucking the
centre” of the game as played, or, with the “flying wedge” of reform,
dash through its lines and destroy the dangerous features of the “mass
play.”

That there should be provision for physical culture in the course of
every educational institution is, of course, universally conceded, but
the question now up for solution is, what character of exercise, or what
system of physical development will come nearer meeting the demand for
such training. The champions of the great American game answer,
“football.” And yet, when we consider the question in the light of all
its pros and cons—and, like all other questions, it has its pros and
cons—its three sides—i. e., your side, the other side, and the inside—we
are led to believe that it specializes athletic sports to such a degree
as to exclude the student body from participation in them. The
systematic development of the physique was first given a pre-eminent
place in the training and discipline of young men by the ancient Greeks,
who sought in this way to perpetuate a hardy and vigorous manhood among
their people. The origin of the Greek games is mythical, yet we know
that they were revived in 776 by the king of Elia and Lycurgus, the
Spartan lawgiver, as a means by which intestine commotions might be
pacified and a pestilence which at that time plagued the people, stayed.
Foot racing, wrestling, leaping, quoit and javelin throwing, and, in
time, chariot racing were the chief sports with which they developed the
physical manhood of the nation. And in this connection, but a moment’s
reflection is required to suggest the benefits derived from such a
variety of sports and diversity of exercise. Contrast the sports of the
Greek game with the exclusive feature of football as played in the
colleges to-day. A college president writes of his institution: “In the
ten years from 1892 to 1902, only seventy-five different men made the
team as players and substitutes out of four thousand or more different
male students during that time in attendance.” But this is an age of
“specialists,” therefore we will let that pass, and there yet remains
the gravest possible objections to the “mass” game. It cannot be denied
with any show of fairness, that its present tendency is to discredit
scholarship and put brains at a discount, while it inflates and
exaggerates the intrinsic value of beef and bone. The primary object of
education is to discipline and develop all the faculties and endowments
of heart and head, while the maxim, “a sound mind in a sound body,” is
by no means to be despised, and yet the hero of the gridiron, the idol
of the college or university, might be a young man of mediocre ability,
or with no brains at all, and with less character than brains. Then,
again, the exaggerated importance which the average student attaches to
the more brutal features of the game creates a false standard of courage
and manhood, and demands ferocious tests that are unfair as the price of
its vindication. False standards of anything in life are, especially to
the young, always perilous, and of nothing is this more than of false
conceptions of what constitutes real courage. For instance, it is a
notorious fact that in the hour of actual battle soldiers who, in “the
piping times of peace,” were renowned fist-fighters and bullies, and
generally looked upon as “bold, bad men,” have, when the thunder of
cannon and the rattle of musketry broke upon their ears, failed to stand
the test of courage, and disgracefully and ignominiously fled, seeking
safety in precipitate flight, while other men, supposed to be physical
cowards, walked calmly and dutifully, and with unwavering step, on
through the storm of grape and shell into the very jaws of death. We are
reminded, in this connection, that the “dunghill” fights splendidly with
his “natural heels,” but it takes a game cock to stand the test of
“steel.” Ought our young men to be educated in an atmosphere in which
such base estimates of true courage and manliness must become the very
breath of their nostrils? Should a young man of culture, courage,
refinement and a high sense of honor be subjected to the humiliation of
being accounted a “cad” by his fellow students because he does not
happen to aspire to “make good” on the team or approve the game? Such a
young man may be a swift runner, a good rider, and a well trained
gymnast, but there is no field for his physical development if he does
not “make good,” and though he be manly, straightforward and proficient
in his work, he has no show with the students with the commonest,
vulgarest and most ill-bred youth imaginable, provided that “darling of
the gods” happens to weigh enough and have enough of the bulldog and
tiger in him. Is it any wonder that the brutality of the game, with all
its barbarisms and degrading tendencies, has at last awakened the
sleeping giant of public opinion, who now threatens to destroy it? And
what complicates the situation more are the revelations that from time
to time have been made, fixing the crime of dishonesty and insincerity
upon some of the faculties of schools and colleges, who have taken
devious and questionable ways and methods to violate their sworn
agreements with rival institutions, and persistently play professionals
as students. But the foxy methods of such schools and colleges have most
naturally tended to disintegrate the student conscience and re-acted
upon their faculties so as to do either one of two things—i. e., cause
the faculty to forfeit the confidence of the better class of students,
or train the student to feel that there is no wrong in dissembling,
cheating or lying where the success of the team is at stake, as well as
the reputation of their college as a leader in athletic sports.

Such a state of affairs most naturally has aroused the interest of those
who are jealous and zealous for the welfare of the colleges and
universities and individual students, and the tide of public opinion has
gradually been swelling until now it threatens the utter destruction of
the game. But will the students themselves come to the rescue and save
the game while there is yet time, by agreeing to an honest, clean
abolition of the objectionable features of the game? For, in the last
analysis of the situation, it is “up to them.”

                                                       WALTER B. CAPERS.

 Columbia, Tenn.


                          Southern Lien Laws.

 Editor Trotwood’s:

The lien laws of most of the Southern states should be repealed. They
have served their purpose, and are no longer needed. They are millstones
around the neck of twentieth century progress. To the uninitiated it may
be necessary to explain that these laws make it possible to use as
collateral for a loan things not yet in existence. It is a mortgage on
air, sunshine, rain and prospects. The renter of a small farm goes, say
in January, to a village merchant, states how much land he will plant,
what he expects the total yield will be and the merchant then agrees to
advance him, from time to time, supplies of all kinds—food, clothing,
implements, and so on, up to an agreed upon amount. For this amount the
merchant takes a lien or mortgage upon the prospective crop.

The cotton crop is not planted until April or May, so that a goodly part
of the supplies are consumed before a seed is in the ground.

The wreck and ruin of a four years’ war left little besides the land of
the South, and the enactment of these laws was an expedient adopted to
meet an emergency. The necessity for them has long since passed, leaving
the laws on the statute books. They have not been repealed because
politicians are afraid of the poor man’s vote. They lack that
independence that would do what is best for him over his protest. That
such laws encourage idleness, dependence, thriftlessness and
improvidence among those who most need to practice their opposites is
well illustrated by the following actual occurrence.

One afternoon last August a friend of mine came upon a white renter
sitting on the bank of Saluda river fishing. During the conversation my
friend expressed the hope that the long drought might be broken by a
shower, whereupon the fisherman replied: “Yes, my melon patch needs hit
powerful bad, but I’ve drawed about all I kin git on my cotton patch
anyway, and I don’t care whether a drap falls on hit or not.”

                                                                H. K. A.

 Laurens, S. C.




        =TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY=          Devoted to Farm, Horse and Home.
 TROTWOOD PUBLISHING CO., Nashville, Tenn. Office 150 Fourth Ave.,
 North.
 ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
                         =JOHN TROTWOOD MOORE,=
                           =Editor-in-Chief.=

 =E. E. SWEETLAND=                                    =Business Manager=

 GEO. E. McKENNON                                              President
 JOHN W. FRY                                              Vice-President
 EUGENE ANDERSON                                                  Treas.
 WOOTEN MOORE                                                     Sec’y.
 ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
    =TERMS OF SUBSCRIPTION=: One Year, $1.00; Single Copy, 10 cents.
                    Advertising Rates on application.
 ───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
                     NASHVILLE, TENN., MARCH, 1906.
 ═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════




                             With Trotwood


The great new South—does it not make one proud to read the record on a
preceding page.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Trotwood begs to thank personally the hundreds of friends who write him
weekly kind things about the Monthly—not only for encouraging letters,
but the more substantial evidence of their appreciation. No one but he
who is making a life fight for what is best in literature knows how much
come-again such letters put into the man who lives in his den at home
thinking out what he hopes will please and instruct. So do not imagine
you will weary him by writing. He needs them all.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Trotwood’s is indebted to Miss Julia A. Royster, of Raleigh, N. C., for
the realistic picture of mammy in this issue. The picture of Jake, in
the January number, was also Miss Royster’s, and we have obtained many
more typical Southern pictures by this artist—the truest and most
sympathetic we have yet seen. Miss Royster will supply these and other
Southern pictures, most artistically executed, to those who care for
them.

                  *       *       *       *       *

I wish to compliment Mr. Brownlow on his able article on “Monetary
Relief,” writes Mr. Denison, of Fargo, N. D. “The plan is a perfect
panacea if we could get a guarantee that bank presidents would keep
their fingers out of speculation.” Mr. Brownlow’s plan seems to meet the
approval of all thinking men. By limiting the amount which each bank may
be permitted to use, restricting the large banks to half a million, and
permitting all the small ones to issue to the extent of their capital
stock, Mr. Brownlow’s plan most effectually keeps it out of the hands of
speculators. We believe when Mr. Brownlow’s plan is thoroughly known it
will be the one adopted.

                  *       *       *       *       *

“I think you have struck the right ‘lead’ in your Monthly,” writes Prof.
Sterling C. Bremer, of the Link School, Thomasville, Tenn. “Unless a
Southern magazine is distinctively Southern, it has no right to exist in
the South. If it is going to give us a lot of syndicate, ready-made
goods, it had better go to New York, where the facilities for that kind
of publication are the best. So continue to give us a Trotwood’s
Monthly, and not a feeble imitation of some Northern magazine, and I
think you will be supported.”

Trotwood appreciates the criticism above, from a scholar in one of the
best schools in the South. The more so because we do not claim any
particular credit for making Trotwood’s different. We are picturing
naturally the life around us—its songs, traditions and ideals. We could
make our Monthly twice as large by using syndicate matter. But it will
add nothing to the thought of the Monthly nor to its quality.

Here are some good ones from a little book called “Philosophy of the
Street,” by E. R. Petherick, of Merrill, Wisconsin. There are hundreds
more in the book as good, and that is saying much:

Two people may differ and both be wrong.

Ridicule is a cross-eyed cousin of wit.

Many of us devote too much energy to increasing our wants.

It is always easy to get a front place by facing the other way.

The man who has no secrets from his wife is a widower.

Cunning is the selfish side of wisdom.

It is a good idea to remember that the present is constantly becoming
the past.

There is about as much sense in judging a man by his talk as there would
be in buying a dog by his bark.

Few people know how to be good to themselves.

After a man has received two favors in succession, he begins to consider
them part of his constitutional right.

                  *       *       *       *       *

“It may interest you to know,” writes Prof. Henry C. Cox, of The Froebel
Public School, Chicago, “that on Christmas Eve sixteen hundred and
sixty-seven children of this school sang one of your Christmas poems set
to music.”

It not only interests us, but it makes us exceedingly vain. To live in
the hearts of children! Who would swap them for the sages? And that
reminds us of several bright things of children—neighbors of Trotwood—so
bright that we thought once of sending them to the Ladies’ Home Journal,
an awfully nice female paper published in Philadelphia, but we have
decided they are good enough for Trotwood’s:

Little Octavine had lived upstairs at grandmother’s all her short life
of four summers, and objected often to walking up the steps. Recently
her parents moved to Nashville. Everybody knows what a beautiful Union
Station Nashville has, but what an abominably long flight of steps leads
from the tracks up to the street. Little Octavine slowly and painfully
climbed them, and when she reached the top sighed and said, woefully:
“Mamma, if you had told me Nashville was upstairs I never would have
moved here.”

Little Ethel, aged two, who can barely talk, saw for the first time the
Jersey cow chewing her cud the other day. Ethel watched her long and
eagerly, but the more she yearned the more indifferent the cow chewed
on. Finally she began to cry: “Mamma, make her let me—chew it—awhile!”

Henry’s mother had been operated on for appendicitis. He didn’t know
exactly, but supposed there was an awful rent somewhere. One day he came
in in time to see the nurse giving his mother a glass of water. “Don’t
do that,” he shouted; “don’t do that! Don’t you know it will just run
out of her?”

                  *       *       *       *       *

In reading some of the business letters on file in Trotwood’s the other
day I came across a letter and its answer that made me catch my breath.
When I reached the P. S. I had the same laugh that you will have—and as
a laugh is always worth money, I am passing it on to Trotwood’s readers.
The letter is from our friend, F. D. Hoogstraat, Ravenna, Mich., who,
after saying many kind things about us and enclosing check for five
subscribers to Trotwood’s, ends with the following friendly bit of fun:
“I was out your way forty-odd years ago, and I killed as many of you as
you did of me, and I feel now that every thing is square and even
between us.”

I turned over the carbon copy containing the business manager’s reply,
and this is what I read toward the latter part of the letter: “We will
be glad to have you come this way again, and we’ll promise to give you a
‘warm reception,’ but not the kind we gave you before. The same Johnnies
who tried to kill you forty years ago with bullets will try it again
with kindness and moonshine whisky. They will charge you with a
handshake instead of a bayonet and will put you in the best bed instead
of a prison. The people of the South look forward and not backward, and
have long ago forgotten and forgiven.

                                              “Yours truly,
                                                E. E. SWEETLAND,

                                          “Bus. Man. Trotwood’s Monthly.

“P. S.—The niggers you were fighting us for about forty years ago are
still here. You may have them now without a fight.”




                          Business Department


Here is a sample letter received; and we get them every day, and above
all we are glad to get them and very grateful for them: “I have been
taking TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY for the past five months and I want to say to
you that I never invested a dollar in my life that I thought I got as
much enjoyment out of as I have the one I sent you for TROTWOOD’S
MONTHLY. I hope all who take it are as well pleased as myself. Frank
Harrington, Eau Claire, Wis.”

                  *       *       *       *       *

Here is another from Mr. F. L. Wacholz, cashier of the First National
Bank, Forest City, Iowa: “I find TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY to be one of the
most interesting magazines that I have read in recent years. The
contents are suitable for any man, woman or child to read with pleasure
and profit.”

                  *       *       *       *       *

If you are “from Missouri” read this one: “Tell your agent in Prattville
that I will refund the money to any one subscribing to TROTWOOD’S
MONTHLY if they are not satisfied with it. McQueen Smith, Prattville,
Ala.”

Mr. Smith can refund if called on, for he had 1,200 acres of cotton in
one field last year.

                  *       *       *       *       *

If you feel inclined to help us along—if you think we deserve help—you
can do us a great favor by asking your friends to send for a sample
copy, or send us their names and we will send the sample copy.

                  *       *       *       *       *

We have received several letters within the past month from northern
subscribers asking for information in regard to the South. We are always
glad to give any information within our power, and will endeavor to
stick just as close to facts as information in our possession will
enable us.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Advertisers when spending money for advertising space want to know where
their inquiries come from. If you will always mention that you saw the
advertisement in TROTWOOD’S MONTHLY we will appreciate it. We protect
you by running nothing but clean and reliable advertising.

                  *       *       *       *       *

“Strictly sound and guaranteed” sounds good in an ad., and the Bay Colt
advertised by P. O. Box 786, Columbus, O., is to be sold with that
understanding.

                  *       *       *       *       *

D. D. Streeter, of Kalamazoo, still offers Thespian for sale, but the
price has been raised. It sometimes pays to buy quick.

                  *       *       *       *       *

The Horse Exchange Co., of Vevay, Ind., can fill the bill if you will
tell them what you want.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Dr. Hopkins, of Fort Branch, Ind., offers something worth the money. In
fact The Home of Bert Onward has some very attractive bargains—not the
marked-down kind, but horses worth the money.

                  *       *       *       *       *

If you know of anybody looking for a thorough and practical man to
manage their farm, you might call their attention to the ad. of J. H. G.
in this issue. We happen to have a personal acquaintance with this
gentleman, and if you are from Missouri, he can “show you.”

                  *       *       *       *       *

If you have a stallion to trade for a splendid pacing mare, read the ad.
from Mr. Dunlap, Clarksville, Ark.

                  *       *       *       *       *

C. R. Kilbury, Plain City, Ohio, offers a stallion that seems to have
plenty of backing in his pedigree, and it will pay you to read his ad.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Ideal Stock Farm, at East Aurora, N. Y., have two offers in this issue,
and Mr. Bradburn, the Superintendent, makes it a point to stick to FACTS
in his ads.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Fleetwood 6280 is offered for sale. Here is the sire of a number of
first-class race horses, including JACK 2:14, that can be bought for
cash or on a trade basis.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Duff Green, of Lonoke, Ark., offers a model stock farm well stocked and
equipped that ought to please somebody looking for a mild climate.

                  *       *       *       *       *

The Grattan-Gentry fillies for sale by Buchanan Farm, Sedalia, Mo., are
said to be extremely handsome and certainly have a rich inheritance,
being backed by fourteen world’s records; ten on the John R. Gentry’s
side and four on the Grattan side.

                  *       *       *       *       *

A. T. Cordray, of London, Ohio, is willing to dispose of a six-year-old
sorrel gelding that has never been started, but will go if given a
chance. Read his ad. in this issue.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Speaking of advertising, we have a letter from one of our patrons who
have been advertising with us from the start, who say they are
advertising in several other publications, and that they are getting
more replies and more business from TROTWOOD’S than from any of the
others. We are going to publish their letter in the next issue, so look
out for it.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Dr. E. Marshall Harrell, of Media, Pa., offers some good horses for
sale, as he thinks he would like an automobile better than the horses.
The doctor probably knows best, and no doubt has marked the price low to
make a quick deal.

                  *       *       *       *       *

Dr. W. R. Spooner, of Republic, Ohio, offers a good trade or cash deal
on Daughter Militant.

                  *       *       *       *       *

C. H. Roberts, of Rochester, Minn., will find what you want in case he
has not got it. Would like some one reading this ad. to buy all his
horses, for he says he is coming to Tennessee to live some day.

                  *       *       *       *       *




                   .. Books by John Trotwood Moore ..


                           _A SUMMER HYMNAL_

A romance of Tennessee. A charming story, full of the tenderest
sentiment, shrewd philosophy, poetic feeling and exquisite humor, the
scenes of which are laid in the bluegrass region of Tennessee, the
“Dimple of the Universe.”

                   _SONGS AND STORIES FROM TENNESSEE_

A book of short stories, poems, etc., including the pathetic story of
“Ole Mistis,” stories by Old Wash, etc.

Price of each book, $1.25 by mail, post paid. Remit by express or money
order or bank check.

            McKennon, Anderson & Foster ❧❧❧ Columbia, Tenn.

                  *       *       *       *       *


                          Confederate Veteran

                     THE _VETERAN_ A VALUABLE ALLY.

In action upon the History Report at the Louisville Reunion, June, 1905,
the United Confederate Veterans adopted with enthusiasm the following:

  It is appropriate to mention the official organ of this body, the
  CONFEDERATE VETERAN, founded, edited, and conducted exclusively for
  the benefit of the Confederate soldiers’ name, fame, and cause, by
  our comrade, S. A. Cunningham. For many years it has been the
  official organ of our own great Association as well as of the United
  Sons of Confederate Veterans, the United Daughters of the
  Confederacy, and the Confederated Southern Memorial Association,
  publishing the proceedings of their sessions, their work, and their
  achievements. Thus it has been the medium through which all that
  concerns the work of Confederate Associations can be so published
  that their coöperation may be made effective. As a magazine devoted
  to the objects of these Associations it is a secure repository of
  war incidents, biography, reminiscence, history, and documents, and
  is already a full treasury of Confederate data. It is very
  gratifying that this ally of ours has attained a high position among
  our country’s magazines. Its issue of 22,000 copies this month
  proves its popularity and certifies its stability. _But your
  committee believes that in consideration of its worth and of the
  broad area of its circulation, South and North, it deserves the
  united support of this body, and it would become of greater service
  to us if all Camps and Chapters would adopt measures to double its
  subscriptions._

  COMMITTEE: CLEMENT A. EVANS, Georgia, _Chairman_; WINFIELD PETERS,
  Maryland; BASIL W. DUKE, Kentucky.

  Address S. A. Cunningham, Nashville, Tenn.

  One Dollar a Year. Liberal Discount to Agents.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                            ALIE VAN—2:29¼.

By McRoberts. Can trot 3 miles faster than 2:20. Large, sound; 7 years
old. Price, $250. Yearling colt (stallion), by Onward-Silver 2:05¼; dam,
Mary Wickliffe 2:24¾, by Red Wilkes; second dam by “Young Jim.” Another
son of George Wilkes. Price, $400. Address

                        THE HOME OF BERT ONWARD,
                           Fort Branch, Ind.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                            POSITION WANTED.

As Manager or Superintendent of large farm or country estate; 43 years
old; single. Almost life experience in management of large farm. Some
business experience. Good references.

                   J. H. G., care Trotwood’s Monthly.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                       FOR SALE—FINE SORREL MARE.

Four years old; record, 2:19, pacing. Can go in 2:08. Splendid
individual. Sire Tito; dam Beauty, she by Hermit. Would like to buy
stallion ready for service. Must be bred right.

                                                       R. D. DUNLAP,
                                                       Clarksville, Ark.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                               FOR SALE.

Stallion, dark mahogany bay, foaled in 1901; 15½ hands; weight, 1,000
lbs.; sired by Billy Parks. 2:15¼; dam by Drexel K, 2:25; second dam by
Harry Clay Wellwoods dam of Drexline (2) 2:27; Miss Thelma, 2:24¼;
Electric Light, trial of 2:20. Third dam by Denmark Smiths dam of Harry
W., 2:22¼. Fourth dam by Flying Cloud No. 134. Worked but little; could
show 2:25 gait; no bad habits; best of disposition; lots of action. The
best road horse in central Ohio. Terms right.

                                                       C. R. KILBURY,
                                                       Plain City, Ohio.

                  *       *       *       *       *


                                SEND US

                           THREE SUBSCRIBERS,

                             TOGETHER WITH

                                 $3.00,

                      and we will send you a copy

                                   of

                         Songs and Stories From

                               Tennessee

                              or a copy of

                            A Summer Hymnal

                          BOTH BY “TROTWOOD.”

                        TROTWOOD PUBLISHING CO.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                               FOR SALE.

Prince Arthur, Jr., Yorkshire coach stallion; foaled in 1898; bay horse;
no white; 16 hands high; weight about 1,300 pounds; fine action; show
horse; sound; sure foal getter. Book filled last season of 70 mares at
$15. Price $1,100. No trade. Cash.

IDEAL STOCK FARM, East Aurora, N. Y.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                               FOR SALE.

Fleetwood 6280. By that grand old sire, Nutwood. His dam is Lottie by
Sentinel. Fleetwood is one of the best bred and best lookers in
Kentucky; sire of a number of first class race horses, including JACK
2:14. Have used him for several years and can show as fine crop of colts
as anybody. Will sell him or trade for younger stallion in order to get
fresh blood. Cheapest horse in the world for his pedigree and produce.
For price and particulars address, C. E. NARY, 267 W. Jefferson St.,
Louisville, Ky.

                  *       *       *       *       *

                               FOR SALE.

A modern stock farm on the Grand Prairie of Arkansas, with a fine
assortment of breeding stock consisting of standard bred horses, young
mules, Red Polled cattle, Poland-China and Duroc hogs, sheep, and a full
equipment of modern farming tools. Telephone connection with city, rural
free delivery of mail. Just the place for a stock lover. Address,

                        DUFF GREEN, Lonoke, Ark.

                  *       *       *       *       *


We want a good live agent in every town in the United States for
“Trotwood’s Monthly.” Write for terms to agents. Address Trotwood
Publishing Company, Nashville, Tenn.

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                          TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES


 1. P. 296, changed “next the trees” to “next to the trees”.
 2. Silently corrected typographical errors and variations in spelling.
 3. Anachronistic, non-standard, and uncertain spellings retained as
      printed.
 4. Enclosed italics font in _underscores_.





End of Project Gutenberg's Trotwood's Monthly (Vol. I, No. 6), by Various