The same thing occurred on the following day, and then I began to
suspect that the colt knew as well as I did what was going on, and was
resolved not to be left behind. So I called to my wife to come and watch
with me, while we experimented. So long as I merely fussed around with
the mare, cleaning her, etc., it was all right, but the moment I touched
the harness and made it appear I was going to hitch up, out shot the
colt from the barn in a moment. We tried this out a dozen times and
always with the same result. This occurred when she was nine days old,
and with conviction I turned to my wife and exclaimed: “She’ll do, the
little Trixy; she’s got brains, and I’ll begin to train her right away.”
Thus she got her name, and I started upon her education.
In my past experience I had taught many horses to respond to questions
with a Yes or No, to paw out numbers, to kiss me, to sit down, lie down,
roll over, and other similar simple tricks. I would ask if they would
like a drink, a feed of oats, a lump of sugar, etc., and teach them how
to answer with a nod of the head, and with a shake when I asked: “Shall
I whip you?” or “I guess you don’t want any feed today,” but with Trixey
I determined to go further than this and see if she really could be
trained, or, better still, _educated_ in any degree.
Thus began Trixey’s education, which continued persistently for eighteen
months. Every day I kept at it, and it might be interesting here to
state that while I was educating Trixey, she was educating me. I learned
a great deal about horses and horse nature in those eighteen months. In
due time I had trained her so that she could pick out numbers on call,
colors, could add, subtract, multiply and divide; could count with her
feet, sit in a chair, on my lap, and answer questions.
I then decided to take her out on the road and give exhibitions with
her. But first of all I decided to give a test exhibition at our County
Fair, at Humboldt, my own town. Of course I was well known, and my
horse-training proclivities were the subject of conversation all
throughout the country, but few knew how much I had accomplished with
Trixey. Hence that first appearance was a great surprise to my
neighbors. Needless to say, it was also a wonderful success. Every one
was delighted with the exhibition and marveled at the intelligence the
beautiful little creature displayed.
I now started to go throughout the country with confidence. I knew what
Trixey could do and what the effect of the exhibition would be upon an
audience. In those days an educated horse was unknown. There were a few
trained circus horses, but a horse like mine excited great wonder and
interest. My method was to go to County and other Fairs, explain what
Trixey could do, and I would undertake to exhibit her before the grand
stand between races. The Fair Associations would engage me, and thus I
would earn a good financial return.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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