Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1894-02-16
Timoleon, hesby Sir Archy, son Of i'm
ported Doomed"
THE TWO MINUTE 1RoTreR.

inn." occupies the entire editorial page of
the last issue of that paper in an attempt
to confute The arguments by which DR..
Bailey, in the Boston paper which grants
its other correspondent So much space.
aud myself in this department, have re
Gently shown the imprObl biliiy that any
horse will ever trot mile to rule in two
minutes. Thi, writer has flippant
smartuess in INDUCING in slur.. probably
fault of youth or country mauners.
which he would do well to suppress in
the future. After peru>al of three and
one-half columns from his pen, fluid but
one qaasi argument in support of his OPP
tmistic views. 1t is not rev, IA. It is
plausible, and he thus states II
How strange it is II progress. which
for at least half century has been
steady, rapid and constantly increasing,
should 20 suddenly have ceased. and that
too. when the interest was at its great, st
height. How wonderful that improve
ment which had been 50 rapid during all
/ those years, when so few that could prop
erlv be considered trotting bred were be-
ing produced should have dropped of 80
suddenly, Just as the point was reached
when the Vpli-bred aud speedy ones we're
being annually turred out by the thou>-
and. 1t is probablc that in the last mouth
or TWO of the trotting season, 50 recently
/ finished. "A greater number entered the
, 80 list than were there. all to d, up to
20 wears ago. and the phenomenon of Il
hundred thousand i apt to be far greater
than what could reasonably he expected
from so small il number n 900 Or less
In the first two sentences OF this quota
ton is the suggestion of an argument
which is admitted to he plausible. and
the last sentence is printed as an expo
sitIon of the manner in which "Nisiou"
flies off to an issue which, like the
Spring flowers. has nothing to do with
the case" When we discuss extreme
speed, in these days, 80 performances
are not in it. The plausibiity of the
argument lies in our dislike to admit
that progress in "A pursuit which has
ever been progressive is ended, or about
ended, in any particular. Yet in this
special case the Boston writer must adj
nit, unless his "vision" is hOpelessly
obscured. that if record of two minutes
should be made in 1891, he could be
called upon to repeat his language in
prophecy of a reduction to :56. and so
ON al MfnHum, or at least to a reductiO
I'D dbSurdum. There is no limit to his
generality, but there is limit to the
speed of trotter, as trotters are now,
hux al, hni 10
progress in breeding which this sanguine
and visionary writer believes in should
produce horse of mammoth height
half mile, for instance-whO could in
pole and the next at the half, we might,
indeed, see mile trotted in two seconds,
instead of two minutes; but it is not
fair to ring in miracles. as St. Peter re-
beat his four bullets" At present
trotters are constructed on the old fash
Toned plan; there is a limit to the length
of their stride and the frequency with
which it can be repeated and this limit
was proved to be, cot last year, but
many years ago, Il rate of about 30 sec
onds to the quarter. In this respect
there has been no advance of consequence
in 20 years, and no fact is palmer than
that the horse was never foaled, and
never will be foaled, who can maintain
for mile his best clip for a quarter.
One more quotation is made from
"VisiCn' before dismissing the subject
1.-The articles claiming the improbable.
ity of 200 ever being beaten laid great
stress upon the much greater speed nee
} essary for quarter in order that the
mile might be made in two minutes. An
: absurdly fast rate was there claimed AS
necessary for one or more of the quar-
tiers, when. in fact, there is IA much great.
er probability that when this is accom-.
plshed it will be. like Directum's cham.
} pion mile and several others of the fast
est for last season, so evenly rated that
there will not be more than second diff
ference between the fastest and slowest
quarters. This would not make it nee.
essary for any quarter to be trOtted fast
err than that distance has already been
trotted, though there has not yet been any
particular incentive for driving that dis
tance at the highest possible rate. and
no one now knows just how quickly a
quarter might be trOtted if special atten-
ton were given to developing and dem
onstrating what could be done for such
a distance
The writer evidently did not compre-
bend the argument he tries to answer
fully agree that in all probability the
best mile by any horse would be evenly
rated at the fastest clip that he could
maintain for the distance. What both
= DR.. Bailey and myself have commended
is that horse to be capable of trOtting a
mile In two minutes must have the abil.
= ity to trot quarter in about IS seconds,
and not by any means that quarter OF
the full mile should be trotted at that
: rate. 1t is the power to carry for mile
= speed of 30 seconds to the quarter that
must be developed and when you argue
Mr.. Vision, do try to reply to what your
opponent said and not to what YOU imaU.