is very different:  carriage-hire is usually twice as high as in England and often more.  However that may be, it is certainly very striking to see the immense number of one-horse “teams” that turn out for an afternoon or evening spin in the parks and suburban roads of places like New York, Boston, and Chicago.  Many of these teams are of a plainness, not to say shabbiness, which would make an English owner too shamefaced to exhibit them in public.  The fact that the owner is his own stableman is often indicated by the ungroomed coat of his horse, and by the month-old mud on his wheels.  The horse, however, can generally do a bit of smart trotting, and his owner evidently enjoys his speed and grit.  The buggies, unsubstantial as they look, are comfortable enough when one is seated; but the access, between, through, and over the wheels, is unpleasantly suggestive for the nervous.  So fond are the Americans of driving that they evidently look upon it as a form of active exercise for themselves as well as for their nags.  One man said to me:  “I am really getting too stout; I must start a buggy.”

I am almost ashamed to avow that I spent five years in the United States without seeing a trotting-race, though this was owing to no lack of desire.  The only remark that I shall, therefore, venture to make about this form of sport is that the American claim that it has a more practical bearing than the English form of horse-racing seems justified.  It is alleged indeed that the English “running” races are of immense importance in keeping up the breed of horses; but it may well be open to question whether the same end could not be better attained by very different means.  What is generally wanted in a horse is draught power and ability to trot well and far.  It is not clear to the layman that a flying machine that can do a mile in a minute and a half is the ideal parent for this form of horse.  On the other hand, the famous trotting-horses of America are just the kind of animal that is wanted for the ordinary uses of life.  Moreover, the trot is the civilised or artificial gait as opposed to the wild and natural gallop.  There are 1,500 trotting-tracks in the United States, owned by as many associations, besides those at all county and State fairs as well as many private tracks at brood-farms and elsewhere.  Stakes, purses, and added moneys amount to more than $3,000,000 annually; and the capital invested in horses, tracks, stables, farms, etc., is enormous.  The tracks are level, with start and finish directly in front of the grand stand, and are either one mile or one-half mile in length.  They are always of earth, and are usually elliptical in shape, though the “kite-shaped track” was for a time popular on account of its increased speed.  In this there is one straight stretch of one-third mile, then a wide turn of one-third mile, and then a straight run of one-third mile back to the start and finish.  The horses are driven in two-wheeled “sulkies”