During the time I was running the race-course and my games at the
lake I was taken down with the yellow fever, and was confined to
my bed for about twenty days. I was about well, and had been
sitting up for a few days, when my horse-trainer, and a friend of
mine by the name of George Leonard, called to see me; and as I was
feeling so much better, they wanted me to go out to the track and
time one of my pacing horses with a running mate. So I muffled
myself up in a big overcoat and went out. I sat in the buggy and
held the watch, but when they came to ask me what time had been
made, I was lying in the bottom of the buggy. They took me back
to my room, and I was just as sick as I had been any time during
the fever. I had the best physician in New Orleans, and he said,
after I was out of danger, that if it had not been for my iron
constitution he could not have pulled me through. I felt the
effects of my last attack with yellow-jack for two years afterward,
and I am not afraid of it to-day.
A short time after getting well of the fever, I was at the livery
stable early one morning where I kept some of my horses. The stable
was owned by my friends William and George Leonard, and they were
large dealers in horses and mules. When I arrived the boys were
red-hot, for they had sold twenty head of good mules to some fellows
the evening before, and had allowed them to put the mules on board
of a little boat lying at the landing, on the promise that they
would pay the money as soon as the bank opened the next day. The
boys had been down to the landing, and had found that the boat and
mules were gone. They wanted me to go with them and catch the
thieves, so we armed ourselves with pistols and double-barreled
shotguns, took a fast packet, and started. About forty miles above
the city we saw the little boat lying at the levee, but as we
passed, it could be seen that there were no mules on board. We
went up about a mile, and then got off and started back a-foot.
When we got near the little boat, we saw the mules in a pasture.
We "let" down the fence and started to drive them out, when the
fellows saw us and came off to stop us. I told the boys to take
the mules and I would take care of the d----d thieves. They were
coming with their guns out. I pulled my shotgun down on them and
told them to halt, which they did. When the boys got the mules on
the run up the levee, I followed them, and the thieves followed
me. They ran us up into a little town, when they got out a replevy
and took the mules. We had a trial and won the case, so we put
our mules on a boat and were soon back in New Orleans. The Leonard
boys get the money now before they let the stock go aboard a boat.