I have in previous chapters alluded to the great horseman of New York durin’ the last generation–Hiram Woodruff. Now Hiram was, as is well remembered, emphatically an honest man. Yet once he took part in a clever little trick that was played on a race track. Frank Duffy, a sport, had a little mare called Lady Kate–”little Lady Kate,” they generally called her. She was matched for a pretty good sum of money to trot fifteen miles within the hour. Frank Duffy, as the custom was in the old times, led his animal up and down the track, takin’ all the bets he could get against her. The mare had a heavy saddle on, and thinkin’, of course, that Duffy was goin’ to ride the mare himself, as Duffy was a very heavy man, a great many people thought, naturally enough, that between the big rider and the big saddle the mare would be overweighted and time would win.
Bets were therefore made on time pretty freely, and Frank Duffy took ‘em cheerfully, and the cause of his cheerful alacrity was soon made plain. Just as the race was about to begin, and just as everybody expected Frank Duffy to mount and be off, Duffy waved his hand three times as a signal. Then suddenly out from some hidin’ place steps a little boy, not over sixteen years of age, with a little saddle in his arms. This little boy was Hiram Woodruff, who was already a tip-top rider. Without a word little Hiram took off the big saddle from the mare’s back and put on the little saddle; big Frank Duffy walked away, and little Hiram mounted the horse and won the race against time.
Of course the sports who had bet their money on time were as mad–mad as blazes–and swore worse than so many bus drivers. No, not worse–that wasn’t possible, but just as bad. But they couldn’t do anythin’ but swear; they couldn’t help themselves or save their money. After all, the transaction was a perfectly fair one. The race had been announced as “at catch weights;” any rider at any weight could mount, only of course the sports, seein’ big Frank Duffy going around with the big saddle, had taken it for granted that Duffy was goin’ to ride, and didn’t dream of Hiram. But there they had fooled ‘emselves, or had allowed their fancy to fool ‘em, and so they couldn’t complain, and had to “stand and deliver.”
All the sports in the old times were fond of horses, and every fighter used to own a racer. Tom Hyer owned a fine trottin’ mare called Lady Blanche. She was a good goer and a good “stayer.” She could stand hard work, and Tom Hyer worked her very hard. Tom was a slashin’ driver. He always, somehow or other, got speed out of a horse, but he had very little skill with, or mercy on, his animal, and poor Lady Blanche had a hard time of it with Tom. When she was in Treadwell’s hands, her original owner, she was used pretty hard, too. Then she went out West, and at last got back to New York again, when Sim Hoagland, the sport, bought her. Sim treated her well, but the mare was pretty old, and altogether used up by this time. One day Sim had been exercisin’ the old mare, and she had seemed to enjoy the exercise. But just as he was puttin’ her under Snediker’s shed the old mare gave a shiver and a quiver. Sim took the shafts of the sulky away from her; then without so much as a whinny, Lady Blanche lay quietly down and died of enlargement of the heart.
This Lady Blanche was a Messenger–a descendant or relative, I believe, of the famous horse Lylee, whose history was more romantic than that of any horse I ever heard of. This horse cost its owner, from first to last, about three millions of dollars, and nearly twelve thousand human lives were sacrificed about him. Such a horse as this may be said to have had a history with a vengeance.
Lylee was a gray horse of the Messenger breed that fell into the hands of an East Indian prince. This prince was a great lover of horses, and had a tremendous stable. He had magnificent stalls built for his horses, and their trappin’s had lots of gold and jewels on ‘em. Cashmere shawls were used as blankets, and everythin’ else to match. He had about eighty horses in all, some of ‘em fine racers, and yet he wasn’t happy.
He had heard of some other prince around him who had a fine horse that could beat anythin’ else in India–a union of Arab and English blood that surpassed any other. So the first Eastern prince made up his mind to get this horse from the second Eastern prince.
E.P.1 tried to buy this great horse of E.P.2, but E.P. No. 2 would wouldn’t sell him for money, nor jewels, nor nothin’. Then P. No. 1 made some excuse or other to make war on P. No. 2 ,the real cause of this war bein’ this horse. In the battles that took place between the two princes over twelve thousand poor devils of men lost their lives. But at last P. No. 2 had to “squeal” and give up the fight.
But he didn’t give up the horse. He tried to “bluff” his conqueror by tellin’ him that the horse had died while they were fightin’ about him. But the conqueror wouldn’t believe this stuff, although the conquered prince assured him on his honor that he had seen the horse die with his own eyes. But still the conqueror wouldn’t have it, but would have his horse.
Then P. No. 2 tried another dodge on P. No. 1. He got a horse that looked a good deal like the real horse, and tried to pass him off as the real horse, but P. No. 1 was too good a judge of horseflesh to be fooled that way. So he sent back the bogus animal by an Italian captain that was in his service, and informed the captain in that pleasant way those Eastern despots have that if he didn’t bring back the real horse with him he would lose his own head. Well, the Italian Captain found out that the real horse was hidden in one of the palaces of Prince No. 2, right where Prince No. 2 was himself. So he marched right to this palace, and by a strategem took the prince a prisoner and threatened to cut off his head at once if he didn’t give up the real horse sine die, as the lawyers say. So you see it was “your horse or your head” with both of these men. Well, to save his head Prince No. 2 gave up the real horse Lylee to the Italian captain, and to save his head the Italian captain gave up Lylee to Prince No. 1, who at last got his horse and made a great fuss over him.
This Lylee was the most expensive horse ever bought. Yet he wasn’t much of a horse to look at, though he was “a rum ‘un to go.” In this last respect he closely resembled the horse Ajax, which once was matched against the horse Oneida Chief to run in sleighs from Harlem Bridge down to Twenty-eighth street. This sleighin’ match made a great excitement at the time, and everybody came out to see it.
There wasn’t any Central Park in those days, it was before Mayor Wood’s time, and what is the prettiest part of all New York now was then nothin’ but a swamp and a rock and a marsh and a wilderness combined. People were willin’ to sell it at any price, those who owned any of it, but couldn’t find anybody fool enough to buy it. There were few road houses then, and such a thing as a Boulevard was unknown. But people love to go sleighin’ and to see fast sleighin’ all the same; so on the day appointed for this big race almost every sport, and half the family men, too, of Gotham put on their overcoats and mufflers and thick gloves, and took their pocket pistols along, and all together protected ‘emselves against the weather and started out to see the great sleighin’ match.
It was the coldest kind of a cold day, and the snow had drifted a good deal, while the wind howled like a lonely hyena. But, although the thermometer must have been down to zero, nearly all the people sat still in their sleighs along the line of the match, or drove along as best they could on either side, confoundin’ the weather and wonderin’ how long it would be before the horses came along.
The match began at Bradshaw’s old tavern, close by the bridge. Harry Jones handled the reins over Oneida Chief, and Hiram Woodruff drove Ajax. There was some heavy bettin’ on the race. Some knowin’ ones, calculatin’ that Oneida Chief was the best pacer that ever yet had visited this country (he was an English horse), placed their money on him; but other ones, still more knowin’, calculatin’ that Hiram Woodruff was by far the best driver of the two men, laid their wagers on Ajax.
Ajax got the lead from the start, and kept it, from the moment he got it, all along. The Oneida Chief seemed to be nowheres. You see, Hiram had contrived to make his horse as determined to win as he was himself, and in spite of all Jones could do he had to give up the race after goin’ about two miles and half, to Yorkville, say.
When he got that far he threw up his whip, which was equivalent to throwin’ up the sponge, slackened his pace, and the race was over.
But the sleighin’ was not. Hiram and Ajax now went in for a good time, and they had it. The nearer the two got to New York, of course the more people there were out to see ‘em, and the more people there were out to see, the more excited Hiram and Ajax got, and the faster Ajax went. Toward the last the horse fairly flew, and the way the bells of Hiram’s sleigh jingled was musical.
Several big bugs along the route, old Mayor Harper for one, thinkin’ they had fine horses attached to their sleighs ventured alongside of Ajax every now and then to give him a brush, but there wasn’t any “brushin’” at all in this case. Ajax fairly swept past ‘em like a torrent. The men cheered and the women clapped their hands, and the children hurrahed, and the roughs swore; they were all so glad at Hiram’s winnin’ the race over the English horse.
And when Ajax got to Twenty-eighth street and Hiram drew him up and got out of his sleigh, a cheer went up that could have been heard blocks away.
“That was sleighin’,” as Hiram used to say afterward, and the amount of applejack swallowed that night in New York city in honor of Ajax and Hiram would have driven the temperance societies crazy if they could have drunk half of it.
[Editor’s notes: A much more accurate and detailed history of the horse Leili can be found on the “Maddy’s Ramblings” website:]
