About the time referred to in the preceding story, the livery
business was very good in New Orleans, and some of the livery-men
kept quite fast horses, which they would let out to persons they
knew would not abuse them. My old friend Dick Barnum was running
a stable in those days, and is in the same business to-day; but he
is getting old now, like myself, and I suppose he goes to church
regularly every Sunday instead of going out to the race-track, as
he and I did twenty-five years ago.
I was at Dick's stable one day when he was feeling pretty good,
and he began bragging on a horse that he had, and which he called
"Tom Parker." I let him blow for some time, when I said to him:
"Dick, you don't weigh more than 140 pounds, and I weigh over 200.
I'll tell you what I will do. I will hitch my black horse to a
skeleton wagon and put on a bag of sand weighing 150 pounds. You
can hitch Tom to a sulky and we will drive our own horses, and I
will bet you $250 that I can beat you one dash of a mile around
the track."