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3gMaTIII1MIHIMIIIIHWBMBi MB33 I OLD TIME RACING. The following account of the great four-mile heat race in 18i2 at Washington, between Black Maria, Lady Relief, Trifle and Slim, and which took five heats to decide is interesting reading: "The southerners were out in great forca and their opinions as to the hist animal in the race were shown by their money. Trifle opening a pronounced favorite at 5 to 4 against the field and S to 3 against Black Maria. Large sums were wagered and tho bad condition of the track was ignorod in the prevalence of partisanship. Trifle stripped as though trained to the hour and, excepting size being only 14.2 showed the racehorse at every point. The conditions called for weight for age. "The quartet moved off well together. Lady Relief slightly in the lead for tho first quarter, Slim, Trifle and Black Maria well up but waiting. In the straight, finishing the first mile, Trifle moved into the lead, Black Maria following and the pair raced in clcse order, Black Maria showing a slight advantage patsing tho stand, this order prevailing during the second and third miles. Turning into the fourth, Trifle forced the pace and showed in front, Black Maria yielding precedence until the stretch was again reached, then, when everybody had giveD up the heat to the southern nag, the black challenged and, after a fieice struggle, passed the post first by a length in 8:C6. The excitement was intense over this result and the usual blame for the loss of the heat was put on Trifles rider, in that ho had made his run too far from home by nearly a mile. Lady Reliefs people had a real excuse for her performance, the saddle having slipped to her withers and the jockey finishing barebacked. "Black Maria went away in front in the second heat, Trifle trailing, and tnis order was observed until tho stretch was reached in the last milo. Here Black Marias jockey, thinking tho race won, took matters tooeasily and the southerner, watching her opportunity, came with a tremendous rush and took Black Maria by tho throat-latch, refusing to be thrown off, and the pair, after a heart breaking struggle, finished on equal terms, the verdict being tho unprecedented one of dead heat in a four-mile heat race. The excitement was not lessened by this result. "The northerners were disgusted and complaining over the showing of their jockey, while the others were correspondingly encoaraged. And they were the more so after the nags had cooled out and appeared for a renewal of the struggle, Trifle showing fresher and full of running, while Black Maria was unmistakably distressed. The southeners thought they had the race now and began to count their gains. "Black Maria got a bad start as the signal was given for tho send-off of the third, which increased the jubilation of the southerners and the depression of their antagonists. It is probable, however, that this materially increased tho winning chances of the northern mare, as her rider made no effort to do better than drop within the distance, and Black Maria really enjoyed a breathing spell during the heat, which was fiercely contested at the finish by Trifle and the Jersey mare. Lady Relief got a decided advantage at the start and held it without sarious opposition to and into the fourth mile. Her ridor, imagining he had the heat safe, took it easily in the stretch, where Trifles jockey stole upon him first aud then challenged furiously and succeeded in taking the heat in 8:13. "Trifle and Black Maria now stood on equal terms, each having a hoat and a dead heat to their credit. Under the modern rules the other two would have retired from the contest, neither having won a heat nor made a dead heat, but the old rules made them still factors in the game. Slim, however, had had enough and dropped out altogether, three going to the post. Trifle is now an overwhelming favorite and, twelve miles having been run, nobody imagined that more than another heat would be required to settle the business in Trifles favor. Tho Jersey mare again took the track followed by Trifle, Black Maria again trailing. Trifles jockey evidently thought that he now had only Lady Relief to beat, and durirg tho second and third miles repeatedly went up to her and was as often shaken off, Lady Relief still going with an apparently unlimited reserve. Black Maria made no move until Trifle had made hor last unsuccessful effort and the last half mile of the heat was reached. Then she challenged tho leaders in earnest, passed the tiring Trifle without opposition and was quickly at the quarters of Lady Relief. Thence tho black and the chestnut, tho two daughters of American Eclipse, had a ding-dong, hammsr-and-tongs fight to tho finish, and amid tho most tremendous excitement, the chestnut, Lady Relief took the heat by a scant neck in 8: 9. "It was still anybodys race, and all sides wore now at sea, tho few followers of Lady Relief being raised to the highest hopes, while the partisans of the other two looked in vain for a chance to hedge. As the fillies cooled out, however, the Black Maria stock rose quickly to par and above. Trifle wbb sien to have shot her bolt effectually, being now " the most distressed of tho trio, while the black seemed to have taken on a new lease of life. She actually lashed out on tbe way to the post. Lady . Relief showed, however, that she had plenty of run ning left in her. The prize evidently belonged to one of the two sisters in blcod. Again and for two miles Maria trailed, leaving the other two to fight for precedence through tho seventeenth and eighteenth miles. Entering the nineteenth mile the last hope of the southerners vanished. Their gallant representative was seen to falter and then to stop to a walk. The game filly had broken down utterly, and tho result was loft to tho other two. A deep and unmistakable groan of anguish rose from tho crowd as Trifle gave up tho desperate contest. Entering tho twentieth milo Lady Relief still had a substantial lead, and Marias jockey as yet had made no move. He was husbanding the last ounce of reserve of his tired mount, and it was not until well around the turn of the last circuit that he called on the daughter of Lady Lightfoot for the supreme effort of her life. The black responded gallantly, and as gallantly and gamely did tho chestnut endeavor to shake her off. Each was worthy of the others steol; whichever won the losir would incur neither dishonor nor reproach. No more could be asked of them that all they had, and. that both were giving freely. Along the side Maria draws oven with her rival. On the backstretch they race head and head, and neither shows tho slightest advantage retained. Into the homestretch they turn as though yoked to a chariot. The courage of neither falters. Both jockeys are working like fiends. Something is bound to yield with such a tension. It is nature herself. Marias pitiless, unvarying, machine-like stride triumphs. Like tho black shadow of a real eclipse she covers her antagonist, draws inch by inch away and wins the twentieth mile, the heat and the race. "The time of the last four miles was 8:47. "Mr. Stevens might almost have exclaimed with Louis XII. after Ravenna: God forbid that I win any more such victories. It "was not quite as bad as that. Trifle rotired to tho stud, her racing promise destroyed by the merciless struggle. Lady Reliof died within a few weeks from the effects of the race. But Maria was steel and whalebone and her recovery from the strain was quick. The following spring she won a three-mile heat race and showed the fastest third heat up to then over made. She ran ten races after her twenty-mile struggle, and her winnings in purses in her total of thirteen victories was 5,C00, a sum considered to be mar-volously large, as it was for that period of tho turf, the purses being then such as the cracks of the present would disdain. There is a curious equality in sums total earned by tho great racers of tho middle heroic period. Mingo, Black Marias brother-in-blood and acknowledged northern champion, retired with little over 5,C00. Triflo herself, in her short career, won 4,000, the famed champion Postboy, not quite 3,C00, and Ariel, another daughter of Eclipse, which won forty-two out of fifty-seven starts, only 5,100. Those were the economical days of the republican turf and republican simplicity of living was not incompatible with the sport of kings. Both Black Maria and Trifle were measurably successful at the stud, neither turning out absolute failures "Longitude" in Canadian Sportsman.
