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Show : STAGE-DRIVERS OF THE OLD WEST. ; ", Th" Chicago Chronicle has the picture of Milton W. Gowdyj the last of the Illinois stage drivers, who drove - the stage between Springfield and Peoria, who often had Abraham Lincoln on the seat beside him, and exchanged ; Inaccuracies with him. The . old chap is 7 J years old. bright-eyed and with a twist to his mouth which indicates , that a wrestle with four or six mustangs in the old days . , "was but a diversion with him. CBut then there was room on the prairies; the steep , and long grades were the things to try men, especially in winter when there was ice on the curves and wheels were Inclined to slide. There were some master spirits in the business in the West, but they are all or nearly all gone, i Tha life was too strenuous. The candle was burned at both ends, and one by one they reached the point of the . Sacramento stage driver when a moment before he died he out of the shadows exclaimed, "It's a down grade and I , can't xeach the brake." Bust stage-driving in those days was a science; only a I select few could get in class A, and they were always fa-rtnous. fa-rtnous. For there must be certain attributes that are high pnes to make a real driver. An eye that can see to exact-i exact-i Hess, hands that never falter and still by a subtle bend of . a finger .or touch of a rein can accomplish seeming im- possibilities, a power of combination that in an emergency . can do the only thing to be done at the right time, a steady courage and that mysterious wireless telegraphy through which horses understand when a master has them in charge. This makes to horses what a real General is to an army. The men in the ranks cannot explain it, but it means that an order from one commander means victory, Xrom another defeat. And great stage-drivers and Generals have some things " In common. Alexander the Great was the best horsemen T In Macedonia; at West Point, there were finer scholars than Grant, but on visiting days when spectators were present. Grant was always sent for when bars were to be leaped over. Bismarck said of Sheridan: "No man ever So understood a horse or could get so much out of him as Bheridan." But stages belong now to the frontier. Even in Nevada the automobile has driven out the horse and his driver. And the old drivers are all gone. |