Page 16 - Allen Gwinn: Horse Racing on the Ice

ISSUE : Issue 19

Published by Ronald Caplan on 1978/6/1

her, just below her breast, around from the forefoot to the hind. On the one side (the both legs) went together. But she got so she didn't need them • she got to trav? elling and there were no horses around that could beat her. It wasn't a race. She'd just go away from them so fast that you couldn't call it a race. They'd blow a horn to start, yes, and if they didn't have a fair start they'd ring a big bell and have to turn them back and start over again. There'd be a couple of judges up at the finish to be sure that they got a fair account of it. Well, they used to play a little trick in getting started • some of them. If they had any favourites, they'd try to get them ahead. If the others got ahead of the one they wanted to see win, they'd try to give him a better start. They'd call you back. There used to be some bad threats. There was one fellow, he belonged to Ing? onish, but he moved down to here, to Cape North, he bought a mare, one that was win? ning a good deal of the races. She be? longed up in the Big Intervale. So one day when my mare began to travel, he and I were going to race right out here, down between the oyster beds as we call it, down at the narrows. He asked me what the track was like, what the ice was like. And I said, "Very good, it's good and solid anyway • no shelly ice." And so, well, he was coming over to try her. He was driving her, of course? he was practicing a lot. But he was coming down. He said that we would measure off the half mile here • and he came down. I was out with the mare, my mare • there were quite a few came out to see. They knew he was coming so they thought they'd get me to follow him. One fellow was coaxing me. Well, I said, "No, I don't want to. If he wants to drive the mare a few times over it so she'd be a little used to the ice..." And he said, "Maybe a snowstorm before you'd get to? gether, and we won't see them together," and so I said, "Okay, I'll follow him, quite a ways behind." And he, the fellow that was leading me to follow him, was down at the starting line and there was quite a crowd up at the finish, so he went up. And I followed him. The first heat he drove. I gained on him that heat. I kept a long ways behind but I could tell I was gaining on him. So when that fellow, that was leading me to follow, went up to the finish, the fellows up there they were talking. Well, they didn't think that that fellow would beat me that much. And the other fellow asked how much did he beat me. They told him in yards, about how far I was behind. So the man said, "Well, he was farther than that when they left." • "Oh, they didn't start together?" • "No, I guess they didn't," he said • came back AIR CANADA >3fy SER CANADA COAST TO COAST THE UNITED STATES * UNITED KINGDOM • EUROPE • CARRIBEAN For information call your Travel Agent or "tE'LEPH'ONE 539-6600 Tourist Brochures & Colour Printjing A Specialty PRINTERS LIMITED 180 TOWNSEND STREET, SYDNEY. N. S. TELEPHONE (902) 564-8245 36 Modern Units Swimming Pool Air Conditioning Tour Buses Vtel6ome Seal IslancI ' Motel and ''' Dining Room ''''L (Licensed) 'i''B Seafood ''V our specialty ''' 674-2418 'I''''Loc ated '''U Overlooki] Cotmtry Living at the Seal Island Bridge CAFE BRSrrav' OWN FURNITDBB UUOWKOOMS Ranges TUdM Chalxa tteoliners Sofas Stereos 'Televisions Carpets Refrigerators Washers Sydney OlaceBay NewWfttei'ord Port Hastings Located between Baddeck and Sydney Overlooking the Bras d*Or Lakes Schwartz

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