triumph that mocked the dead Caesars. Of this the old negro on the
front seat missed little. He was singing, softly singing. And leaning
forward I listened.

"Curry a mule an' curry a hoss,
Keep down trubbul wid de stable boss!"

sang Uncle Jake.

OLE MAN SANFORD

"Do you happen to notice a old duck that comes to the stalls at
Loueyville just after the derby?" asked Blister.

"Was his name Sanford, and did he wish to pat the mare?" I asked in
turn.

"That's him," said Blister. "Ole man Sanford. It ain't likely you
ever heard of him, but everybody on the track knows him, if they ever
hit the Loueyville meetin'. They never charge him nothin' to get into
the gates. He ain't a owner no more, but way back there before I'm
alive he wins the Kentucky Derby with Sweet Alice, 'n' from what I
hears she was a grand mare. Ole man Sanford breeds Sweet Alice
hisself. In them days he's got a big place not far from Loueyville.
They tell me his folks get the land original from the govament, when
it's nothin' but timber. I hears once, but it don't hardly sound
reasonable, that they hands over a half a million acres to the first
ole man Sanford, who was a grandaddy of this ole man Sanford. If
that's so, Uncle Sam was more of a sport in them days than since.

"I don't know how they pry it all loose from him, but one mawnin' ole
man Sanford wakes up clean as a whistle. They've copped the whole
works--he ain't got nothin'. So he goes to keepin' books fur a whisky
house in Loueyville, 'n' he holds the job down steady fur twenty years.
The only time he quits pen-pushin' is when they race at Churchill
Downs. From the first minute the meetin' opens till get-away day comes
he's bright eyes at the rat hole. He don't add up no figgers fur
nobody then. He just putters around the track. He's doped out as
sort-a harmless by the bunch.

"After the Tres Jolie mare wins the derby fur me, ole man Sanford makes
my stalls his hang-out. I ain't kickin', all he wants to do is to look
at the mare 'n' chew the rag about her. That satisfies him completely.

"'Of all the hosses, suh, who have been a glory to our state,' he says,
'but one otheh had as game a heart as this superb creature. I refer to
Sweet Alice, suh--a race mayah of such quality that the world marveled.
Not in a boastful manner, suh, but with propah humility, let me say
that I had the honor to breed and raise Sweet Alice, and that she bore
my colors when