The speaker was of more reputable aspect than any of the others. He was the only man in the room with a clean-shaven jaw and wearing a coat; the abnormal size of his right arm, visible under the sleeve, indicated the vocation of a blacksmith. He had a round bullet head that implied a sort of brute force, and his black hair was short and close-clipped. In view of his mental supremacy and his worldly superiority as a respectable mechanic the authority he arrogated was little questioned, and, as he flung himself back in his chair, tilted on the hind legs and fixed his sharp black eyes on the half tipsy jockey, Connover sought to justify his statement by adducing proofs. “Why,” still flicking his boots and thrusting his stable-cap far back on his sparse sandy hair, “there is Edward Floyd-Rosney and family, and he is a millionaire. You are obliged to know that.” Jasper Binnhart nodded his head in acceptance of the statement. “And, Lord, what a string he had before he sold out when he went abroad. He owned ‘County Guy,’ the third son of imported Paladin, dam Fortuna, blood bay, stands sixteen hands high, such action.” He smote his meager thigh in the abandonment of enthusiasm. “I saw him in Louisville at the training stables--such form!” “And who else?” demanded Binnhart. “Why, a beautiful roan filly--three years old--Floyd-Rosney gave only three thousand dollars for her, but speedy! And he owned----” “Who else is on that boat?” reiterated Binnhart raucously. “I don’t want to hear ’bout no horses, without I’m on my shoeing stool,” he added with a sneer. “Oh, yes, I know, of course.” The jockey felt the bit himself and adapted his pace to the pressure of control. It seems strange to contemplate, but even such a nature as his has its æsthetic element, its aspirations and enthusiasms, its dreams and vicissitudes of hope. All these just now had a string on them, as he would have phrased it, and were dragging in the dust. He had ridden with credit in several events elsewhere, but he was the victim of intemperance and his weak moral endowment offered special material for the fashioning of a cat’s paw. It was said and believed that he had “pulled” more than one horse in a race, and although this was not indisputable, the suspicion barred him from the employ of cautious turfmen. In connection with his frequent intoxication, it had brought him down at last to work as a groom for his daily bread, and what was to him more essential, his daily dram, in a livery stable in the little inland town of Caxton, some ten or twelve miles distant, for there was scant opportunity in view of the stringent laws against gambling to ply his vocation as a jockey in Mississippi.