White Dandy; or, Master and I: A Horse's Story

CHAPTER VI.

Before I had been in M—— long I was willing to admit that hitherto I had seen and heard little of the dark side of life for the dumb creation.

The doctors rented stalls for us in a big livery barn, usually trying to keep one or two of us at a time out at the farm on pasture.

At this latter place I learned considerable of the beauties(?) of country life from our standpoint.

The Stringers were average people, ambitious, but erring in judgment. They were thoughtless and ignorant, rather than cruel—intentionally cruel, I mean; but it does not alleviate in the least the pangs of thirst and hunger, the pain of extreme heat and cold, the tiresomeness of long continuance in an uncomfortable position, or the woes of a mother torn from her offspring, to know that carelessness is the cause of the trouble.

I tell you I used to pity even the chickens on that place, and, in conversation with other animals, there and elsewhere, I have found that the Stringers represent the majority of farmers. There are so many what they call "big things," to attend to, that there is no time for either attending to dumb creatures' comforts or stopping the small leaks in the grain sacks.

I am not surprised at all that so many farmers die poor, and so many go fretting through life declaring that farming don't pay. It will never pay the great "Stringer" majority.

Speaking of the chickens, I have seen them trailing their wings through the hot dust, day in and day out, peering everywhere with their anxious little eyes for one drop of water.

On that farm there was only a well, and the water was drawn by means of a pole with a hook on the end of it. It was pretty slow, hard work, so that no animal got all the water it really needed at any time; besides we are just like "other folks," we need to have water where we can drink if we are thirsty, not be obliged to gulp down a lot when we don't want it, simply because we know it is all we will get for hours. Men feed us things that burn and irritate our stomachs just as salt fish does theirs. They drink when they are thirsty if that is every few minutes, but with an equal longing for water we must wait their convenience, if that is all day.

We are ofttimes sick and feverish, too, just the same as people, but we can't speak, and so we must endure the torture, after being driven furiously through the dust and under a pelting sun.

It is terrible to suffer from a burning thirst, but no worse for a man than for a horse, and no worse for a horse than for a canary bird. We do not suffer always in proportion to our avoirdupois or mental caliber.

Mrs. Stringer was in the habit of shutting hens up, who differed with her on the subject of sitting, in boxes or barrels without food or water, and a good many times she was surprised, after leaving them there three or more days, to find them dead. A terrible death to die, to all but literally burn up with "setting-fever," inward thirst and lack of fresh air.

If I were a man what I am going to say now would be wicked, but I am only a horse. Well, I have often thought that a place I hear men around livery barns speak of, said to be heated by fire and brimstone, will like as not receive many recruits from among ministers and deacons who have neglected to water and shelter their horses and stock here, and among the so-called Christian women who let their chickens, especially setting hens, die of thirst.

People who are so stingy of God's cold water here will know what thirst means in eternity, or I am mistaken. And the hogs on that farm—how they beg (squeal) for something cool and clean to drink.

Somebody, who thinks just as the Stringers did, laughs at the idea of a hog wanting a clear, cool drink. More is the pity! Why, time and again have the poor swine told me that they only drink swill and such stuff because nobody ever offered them anything better. They don't mind having decent swill used to mix their messes with, but they can appreciate a clean drink as well as a man can. I get out of patience, too, hearing so much about the "dirty hog," when the poor creature would be clean if he had half a chance. Of course, his ideas of cleanliness differ from a dainty maiden's; he enjoys a mud bath, but he will always take clean mud if he can find it, and he doesn't enjoy wading around in a filthy pen more than you or I would. Is there anything cleaner or prettier than a young pig? Take one and give it decent care and surroundings and it will never disgust you with its filth. The majority of swine are fed on rotten, putrid things, simply because they are swine.

One blessing, the careless owner of either hog or fowl, who allows it to eat that which is unclean, will get it all back second-hand if he eats the creature.

There were not less than a dozen calves in a barren lot on this place, and I used to actually dread my day out there, because of the ceaseless bellowing for water kept up by the helpless creatures.

It was the business of the hired man to fill up a tub over in the lot for their convenience, but there was always "so much to do," and everybody was in "such a hurry" that it was forgotten or neglected more often than it was attended to, and then the owner wondered why his calves were such "scrawny things."

The cows were little better cared for, though they usually got a small allowance of water once a day. They did not begin to give the milk they would, had they been abundantly watered, though, and suffered in proportion. There was one thing that Mrs. Stringer was righteously diligent about and that was salting them. This would have been most commendable had there been drink supplied in connection; as it was, it only augmented their misery.

We horses fared better, because Park was sent out with strict orders to refill our trough with cold water twice a day. Of course, he did not always obey, and I suffered enough, long sweltering days, to make me pity the other creatures that fared worse.

The most trying thing of all would be when, during the day, we—cows, calves and all—could hear the familiar sound of that well-pole as the family drew and appropriated the cooling liquid. It did seem they might understand the bellowing on all sides; but if they did they heeded not.

My master was so busy the first year that he paid little attention to the farm, but the second summer, toward the end, he had a pump put in the well. That worked wonders for awhile, and then they grew as neglectful as ever.

Of course, we did not stay out there much in winter, but were back and forth sometimes. For my part, I wished I might not go at all, but the lecture my master gave Mr. Stringer one evening paid me for being present. It was coming on a cold sleet storm, and his cattle were huddled on the leeward side of the barn, otherwise unprotected. Their piteous lowing could not but attract the attention of a man like Dr. Dick.

"Why did you not provide shelter for them?"

"Hadn't lumber."

"There seems to be a good many boards and pieces of timber going to ruin around here, and there is all the straw decaying in the field where the machine left it. You could have built sheds, and any essential that was lacking we would have provided."

"Well, it don't hurt critters to stand out; it jest hardens 'em."

"I tell you, sir, you are mistaken. All domestic animals need shelter, clean bedding and plenty of food. They need it, and it is their right. They furnish you with food and much of the money you have; do they not, in turn, deserve something? Besides you are defrauding yourself when you defraud them. The neglected cow will not begin to do as well in the way of milk and butter as the one that is well cared for. The food she eats must go to keep her from freezing; it acts in the place of fuel, as it were, while if you attended to keeping her warm, it would go to make milk and meat. These are unalterable laws of nature; disregard them and you pay the penalty, not only here but hereafter. God has promised mercy only to the merciful."

We went on, then, for the storm was increasing, but a few days after I noticed that rude sheds were in process of construction, and the straw was being brought in to help in the work.

I am so glad that my master dares to speak his mind, and yet he never does it in a way to offend. Any one can see that he feels every word that he says, and above all he practices what he preaches.

Speaking of the care of cows reminds me of one that used to hang around the livery stable and pick at the straw that was thrown out from our bedding; and at night, especially very cold ones, she would come and lie on the manure pile. Some of the men said it was for the sake of the little heat in the manure, and they thought she must have a wretched place at home, and be almost starved into the bargain. I watched my chance, and asked her about it. She said her owner was quite well off, but that he looked upon an animal as having no more feeling than a wagon; indeed, that he took better care of the latter than he did of her. That she was hungry all the time, and "oh, so cold." She was not giving milk just then, so they paid no attention to her. She said she had been in the pound twice, and that was dreadful, but she would as soon be there as at home.

I guess the pound man thought she belonged at the livery stable until Park Winters called his attention to the matter, and she was driven off and I never saw her again.

It seems strange that people can sit down to well-filled tables, knowing that their animals are starving; and lie in soft, warm beds, knowing that they are freezing. Master says that for all these things man shall be brought into judgment, but it don't help the dumb creatures now.

CHAPTER VII.

Such a variety of horses as one meets when boarding at a livery stable, and what stories they can tell!

A tough-looking pair of mustangs gave a little of their experience one night. They said they were once wild, roaming over the western prairies at will; but that some Indians caught them with a lasso, and then sold them to a cowboy. The latter named them "Daredevil" and "Wildcat," and began to break them.

"Regularly, as he took us in hand," said Daredevil, "he knocked us each down from ten to fifty times. Why, I used to be just crazy from fright and pain, but he called me vicious, and said he would pound it out of me. Sometimes he would strike me on the head and stun me so that he would think me dead, but he never seemed to care. Had he used us kindly I do not think we would have been hard to manage at all, after the strangeness and fright wore off a little, but such treatment as he gave us brought out all that was bad and wild; I guess it would have made a daredevil and wildcat out of any creature. He did not mind at all if the bit tore our mouths till the blood poured out, or the whip laid open our shoulders and flanks till he could lay his three fingers in; a mustang can stand anything. How frantic we were for release from such torture, and how hard we tried to kill ourselves."

"And then," put in Wildcat, "when he considered us broken, he used to ride us almost to death. Many and many a mile have I run without stopping for breath, with those dreadful spurs pressed deep into my bleeding sides."

"Indeed," said Daredevil, "the wound never healed in mine; it was just tearing a little deeper each day."

Then it seems they were stolen by a half-breed Indian and sold to another white man, who treated them no better. His business was to assist emigrants across the mountains, and he used to overload them and goad them with a sharp pointed staff until they were obliged to move on, some way. They lived this sort of life for three years; then being almost worthless, he sold them to an Eastern man who was buying up mustangs. They were shipped to Chicago in a close, wretched car, being forty-eight hours at a time without food or water.

"I can give you no idea of the horrors of those days," said Wildcat. "It was just like what burning alive must be, and we all got so ugly that we kicked and bit furiously. Two or three of the weaker ones were trampled to death, but when once the agony was over, they were objects of envy. We all wanted to die. A few became delirious and had to be shot when we were taken out.

"Daredevil and I match so perfectly that we were at once sold together again to a little fellow from Wisconsin. He seemed to think that being mustangs we would require a good deal of abuse and hard work and not much to eat. Anyway he only paid a few dollars apiece for us. I have noticed that the more an animal costs, usually, the better care it receives. This fellow used to pound us till the neighbor women would come out, wringing their hands and crying, and beg him to stop. He would tell them that it was the only way to manage a mustang.

"Desperate at last, Daredevil watched her chance, and planted both her hind feet in the small of his back, one day, and doubled him up. It did me good to see the folks venture gingerly up, expecting us to scalp them, I suppose, and bear him off. He'd knocked us down a good many times, and then without pity kicked us till we got up.

"We were immediately sold to an easy-going individual who worked us very hard, but was decent in his treatment. This was the best place we had had, and we tried to please him. His easy-goingness got him into debt, though, and we had to go for that to the man who now owns us. He is a notion peddler, and well enough when sober, but he is usually drunk. He may start in the morning and drive us till after dark without a drop of water or bite of food."

"There is one thing," said Daredevil, as her mate paused, "if only men knew half as much as they think they do, they would never pound and abuse a mustang pony. There is lots of work and endurance in us, if well treated; and we can appreciate kindness as well as a thoroughbred, if they will give us time enough to realize it. We have no sort of chance to be good, and the way they treat us would spoil any creature."

There was a little silence after the mustangs had ceased speaking, and then "Jennie," a livery horse, spoke.

"Well, you certainly have had a hard life and probably always will, but if there is any fate to be prayed to be delivered from, it is the fate of a livery horse. We are always on the road. Why, this is the first night I've been in this week, and every sound I hear I think they are coming for me. I have grown so nervous that I can't sleep, and my whole body aches.

"A drummer hired us last week on Wednesday, to drive out to S——, nineteen miles. Said he would be there all day and possibly all night. Do you know he only stopped there about half an hour, gave us—Nellie and I—some water and then drove fifteen miles to L——; there he had us fed and watered, and in an hour was off fourteen miles to K——. It was late when we got there, and by daylight he was on his way here, a good forty miles by the nearest route. We had barely been rubbed and fed, when a young man wanted a team to take his girl to a party ten miles out. The boss, supposing we had been in the barn at S—— all the time since the morning before, only while going the thirty-eight miles there and back, sent us out again.

"It did seem to me when they began to harness us that I should scream right out; how I longed for the power of human speech!

"My, but didn't that fellow drive!

"We acted pretty tired, I suppose, for presently the girl said: 'John, don't drive so fast, the poor horses seem tired.'

"'Nonsense, they are livery horses, and that is one of their tricks.'

"He tied us, dripping with sweat, in an open shed and left us until near morning. Actually we were so stiff we could not seem to get along at all, but he was not sparing of the whip.

"We were in until afternoon some time, and one of the boys used us to carry a couple of women to S——. He rested us an hour and then came home again.

"And so it has been right along, and I am so tired; and then this being driven by every one is ruinous on mouth and nerves. It is jerk, jerk, jerk! and no two mean quite the same thing by the way they twitch the lines, and half of them don't know how to drive anyway."

"Yes," put in Crusoe, another livery horse, "and the worst of it is the spirit people manifest toward us. Why a clergyman had me the other day to go up to B——, and he drove faster than any jockey. On the way he picked up an acquaintance who remarked after a while on his fast driving.

"'Well,' said the minister, 'I always like to get the worth of my money, and I've got three dollars invested in this animal to-day.'"

"Oh me, and how they swear at us!" chimed in a small bay mare from another stall.

"Who, the clergyman?" cried Julie, now for the first time speaking up.

"No, I did not quite mean them, though I carried a bishop, or some sort of a big gun, once to the train and we were late. I am inclined to think he swore to himself, though all he said out loud was: 'I could have made that team cover the ground,' but I meant people in general."

Then somebody from another stall spoke out in a tone quivering with sadness.

"My friends, if you are not blind don't complain of your lot."

"Amen," came softly, but distinctly, from another corner and we all kept silent.

Presently the first voice said:

"It seems strange enough to be counted old and only fit to be banged around without this dreadful sightlessness."

She paused again, and I ventured to ask the cause of her misfortune.

"It is inherited. My mother was blind and not of much use but to raise colts, they said. Whether they knew that blind mothers are liable to transmit their misfortune or not I do not know; but the fact remains. I could see all right until I was four years old; when one day, getting pretty warm, a mist seemed to come before my eyes. It remained growing steadily more dense, until at night I was entirely guided by my mate, and when loosened from him could not even find the familiar watering trough.

"'What ails Kate?' somebody asked, while some one else added, 'She acts blind.'

"Presently my master examined my eyes and gave it as his opinion that I was stone blind, and I was and have been ever since.

"No words can describe what I suffer. No one has a thought of pity for a blind horse; it is just rush them along! I am so much afraid; everything startles and terrifies me; I am always stepping on stones or bruising myself on stumps and things that I cannot see. I stretch my neck out long to listen, and I am jerked and called an old blind fool!

"It hurts my feelings, too; it is so dreadful to be afflicted and then be taunted with it and scolded about it. Nearly all my brothers and sisters went blind in the same way."

We Wallace horses longed for a barn of our own, where we could have our little family visits once more, and where we should not see and hear so many harrowing things.

Topsy was growing a fine, little animal, but between Chet and Park she was bound to be ruined. These two were never friends, and the latter was, besides, jealous of the young owner. He tried a variety of means to make her nervous and unmanageable, always picking at and tormenting her. He had her so that she would both kick and bite.

Remembering his own unhappy experience, it made Prince furious, and then there would be trouble between him and Park. Of course, the former got the worst of it, because man is the stronger, in the only sense that tells, and the latter would tie him short and then whip him or kick him. Chet had no judgment, and being exceedingly passionate, he whipped the colt for doing what Park taught her.

Meanwhile Mrs. Wallace's sister, Minnie Winters, had become almost a member of the family. She was not very old nor ugly, and professed the most unlimited admiration for "that dear little Dandy," as she gushingly termed me, though why she called me "little" I can't imagine, and I did not like it either. I noticed, though, that she did not make as much fuss over me when my master was not around. She said a great deal about horseback riding, and hinted strongly that she would like to try my back.

"Dandy's life is like my own," said Master, "all work and no play."

By this he intended her to understand that I had no time to take her out for pleasure. One day Master and I were starting for the country, when some one called him. It just happened that I was tied near an open window inside of which sat Mrs. Wallace and her sister, and I was obliged to hear their conversation.

"You ain't half trying, Min," the former said.

"Goodness, Fan, do you expect me to throw myself at the man's head? Dick Wallace is a different man from Fred; and not to be so easily won. Indeed, I don't believe he has any notion of marrying."

"Notion of it? Of course he hasn't, but you must put him in the notion. He has a romantic idea that his heart is buried and all that——"

"Oh, do hush, Fan. Somehow I can't bear to think of his having loved any woman like that, and I think Dandy was hers! It all seems like a novel."

"Of course, but if I were in your place I'd be Mrs. Dr. Dick, or know the reason why."

"I know the reason why now," laughed the girl; then growing sober, she added: "I am not good enough for him if he wanted me; few women are."

"Nonsense! Well, you are evidently badly smitten any——"

"Hush, he's coming," interrupted Min.

CHAPTER VIII.

There was a very learned (?) young man—a lately fledged M. D.—who, while spending a few weeks in the town, often sought my master's company. Among other things he, the young man, talked pompously and heartlessly of his love for using the knife.

"I just delight in surgery," he affirmed. "When I first went to college the sight of blood unmanned me, and I was weak enough to shrink from cutting up even a cat; but I soon cut my eye teeth, and now I don't mind anything; would like no better practice than to dissect a live human being."

As Master made no reply and the blood-thirsty young M. D. did not understand, as I do, a certain ominous silence on the former's part, he went airily on:

"I intend to make a specialty of scientific research as soon as I've earned money enough to make it possible. There is very much to be discovered yet, I am convinced. By the way, I suppose you read all the reports of our own and German vivisectionists?"

"I confess to skipping some."

Strange the young fool blundered right on into the trap, but then he had the "big head"—whatever that is; Master says all young doctors have a spell of it, and that some never fully recover—and thought Master's silence was induced by a feeling of ignorance and inferiority.

"Well," said he, "you know, of course, that chloroform is not used as much as formerly in the practice; our modern scientists are using curare, a drug, you understand, that paralyzes motion while sensibility is unimpaired. It is a great thing. The creature endures the greatest amount of suffering possible under the circumstances, and makes a fine study. I have a few notes here taken from recent reports. I assure you they are worthy of attention. Vivisection is going to prove a boon to suffering humanity."

I knew by the tremor along the reins that Master would be unable to control himself much longer. And then the young man read an extract taken from a book he called "A Microscopical Study of Changes," that told of the torture of a number of kittens. Some were starved eleven hours and from that on up to seventeen. They were then made mute and motionless by means of this drug, curare, but were acutely conscious. After this stimulation was continued for five hours. In another case the sciatic nerve in various creatures was stimulated with electricity from one-half to seven hours. There was a good deal more telling of the work along this line in various noted universities and medical schools. Speaking of instances where the sciatic nerves of cats are divided and the spinal cord experimented upon in rabbits, it told of their wild shrieks of agony. In dogs the thyroid glands were removed and their consequent sufferings described. A noted Eastern scientist excites inflammation in the eyes of small animals by passing a thread through the corner and applying croton oil, hot irons and the like. Another professor "hobbled" over 140 dogs, and then dashed them from a height of twenty-four feet upon bars and ridges of iron. And so he went on telling of cutting up live animals, even of a horse that was vivisected. At last he was describing, with evident relish, the sufferings of a dog that some New York professor had twisted all out of shape and fastened in a plaster of Paris cast for several weeks, the creature's sufferings being so great that it scarcely took any food at all, when Master burst forth.

Well, I can never begin to tell what he said; his words were like thunderbolts, and the very atmosphere was blue with the lightnings of his righteous wrath. Out of it all I learned that he considered vivisection (cutting up live animals) not only unnecessary to the interests of humanity and science, but a most criminal proceeding. He denounced the vivisection professors as bloodthirsty scoundrels, who, under the pretense of making scientific research, are merely satisfying a bloodthirsty curiosity of their own. He said such men are never public benefactors, that, in truth, they care nothing about alleviating human ills or prolonging life. It is a mania with them to cut, cut, cut, torture, torture, torture. He further said that something must be done to stop vivisection in our common schools and colleges; that ordinary pupils have no need for even lessons in dissecting dead bodies.[A] Physiology, he said, can be taught all that is needful without recourse to hardening, brutalizing experiments. For his part, when his hour of suffering comes, he said he wanted a physician with a heart as well as head, and he would sooner that a boy or girl, dear to him, would grow up unable to read or write than to be a scholar without feeling and humanity. His conclusion was something like this: "And now, my young friend, pardon me if I have spoken hotly, but I feel deeply on these matters. You, with thousands of other youths, are more sinned against than sinning. You admit that you were tender-hearted when you went away from home influences, and seem ashamed of it. Crush that feeling, my boy; the manly man is always tender-hearted; in other words, God-like. Pity and tenderness are God's own attributes. Further, you will never be a truly successful physician unless your touch is tender as well as firm, unless your heart is as full of sympathy as your head of wisdom. I do not say that there may not be some experiment necessary in medical schools, but none where entire insensibility is not induced. I know what I am talking about, and thousands of our older and better physicians at home and abroad bear me out in this statement."

I guess the young M. D. was glad that Master reined up, at this juncture, before a pretty white cottage; anyway, I noticed that he neither resumed the conversation nor attempted to patronize Master during the remainder of the drive.

CHAPTER IX.

That morning my master stopped first at a farmhouse where everything betokened plenty, but not thrift. A man was slopping hogs. The latter were in a small inclosure, wading in mud almost up to their bodies. How hungry they seemed, and how vigorously he dealt blows right and left, with a club he carried!

The low troughs were one-third full of mud, and into these he poured the swill.

"Dear me," I thought, "they can never eat it," but they did; that is, some of them. A few of the weaker ones were crowded back and got nothing.

Often in passing that place in winter, I have noticed that in feeding cattle, the fodder was thrown on the ground to be pawed over, stamped in, and the greater part of it wasted. The cattle here were thin-looking in the spring, with apparently no ambition but to find a tree or rail against which to rub. I was not surprised when I heard that that man had mortgaged his farm.

Toward noon of the day first mentioned we drove into a farmyard where a boy unhitched me and turned me into a nice pasture. There were several horses and cows beside. One of the latter ran ceaselessly from side to side of the inclosure, calling piteously. No need to inquire her trouble; one look into her dark, pleading eyes and any one could recognize a sorrowing mother. One of the horses told me that it had been just that way for almost a week; that day and night it was the same. Said he: "She has not eaten a mouthful since her little one disappeared. You see they let it run with her until it was seven or eight weeks old. She was so proud of it; and an uncommonly cunning calf it was. They were always together; but one day some men came and drove it away and she has been almost crazy ever since."

Just then the poor animal passed near us in the endless circuit, and such a look of agony and entreaty as she wore! Presently a man came to the bars; straight she rushed toward him, bellowing piteously. Of course, he passed indifferently by, and then, turning, she walked to a little clump of trees.

"See!" said my companion; "she will stop under that oak at this corner; there is where she used often to lie with the calf." And sure enough she paused there, smelling the ground over and calling in a low tone; then down on her knees she went, laying the side of her face against the sod and moaning and crying as any human mother would. Oh, it was pitiful, pitiful!

"One has to stand a good deal like that in this world," the big roan said, turning his face away, "and yet people think we dumb creatures have no feeling. I wish we hadn't. A while ago, the family let another cow and calf run together in the same way, and then butchered the little creature right before its mother's eyes. She has never been the same since; doesn't eat, and her milk isn't good. Poisoned with the grief and fretting, but the folks don't understand."

Another day I was grazing in the pasture of one of Master's patients, when I noticed a cow standing in the shade of a tree contentedly chewing her cud.

"A happy looking creature," I remarked to the old family horse, who was quietly grazing away his days.

"Yes," he said, with a smile. And right here let me say horses do smile. "She thinks her calf is over on the other side of that high board fence, in the calf pasture, while in reality it was sold a week ago. You see our master is a merciful man; he separates the mothers from their young almost from the first. For a while he lets the calf through a door in the wall, to its mother, three or four times a day, then twice, and finally not at all; but all the while each is content, because they believe the other is right there. The cow is not worried, and gives down her milk bountifully; the calf is content and thrives. My master is not only merciful, but shrewd."

"And you seem to have an easy time," I suggested.

"Easy, to be sure. He says I have done hard work enough to retire, and have earned money enough for him that he can afford to keep me on the interest of it."

One event of interest, to part at least of the Wallace family, I have not mentioned. It was when we had been at M—— about a year. Grim had been down street with the boys, and on reaching the gateway of home he fell in a fit. Master and I had just driven up. Mrs. Wallace, from the piazza, gave a cry and began to scream, "Mad dog." Poor Grim, coming out of it, rolled his eyes piteously from one to another. With a desperate struggle he regained his feet and attempted to walk, but his back gave way and before the doctor could reach Grim he lay writhing in another spasm. Mrs. Wallace screamed the louder from a safe place inside the door; and Master, speaking rougher than I ever heard him speak to her before, bade her be still, adding that the poor fellow had been poisoned.

"Bring me a bottle of sweet oil from the office," he commanded Park, "and be quick about it."

Grim was coming out of the fourth fit when the oil came, and among them they managed to pour a gill or so down his throat. He had ever so many more spasms, but finally got better; that is, he did not die then, but never got well; just pined away and finally died.

By this means we became aware that M—— had a cat and dog poisoner; "a man too mean to live and too wicked to die," the neighbors said of him.

Many handsomer and more valuable dogs than dear old Grim fell a victim to his rascality, but few were more sincerely mourned. So officious was this individual that it was nothing uncommon to see little girls bending their curly heads over pet kittens stiff as death, or ladies wringing their hands in agony over the sufferings of some canine or feline pet.

And the sufferings of the latter were terrible to witness.

But I have heard say that every town has one man in it so far lost to human decency that he assumes the right to thus torture other people's pets.

Master says there is nothing uncertain about the future of such men. I don't quite know what he means, do you?

Minnie Winters professed to be "not over strong"—these were Mrs. Wallace's words—and the latter frequently asked Dr. Dick to let her sister go with us when we were out for short drives. He could hardly refuse. Of course, I heard every word of their conversations and noticed how commonplace all the doctor's remarks were, and how adroitly he parried all sentimental or even personal allusion on his companion's part; but nevertheless I was uneasy. I did not think so badly of Minnie, but Mrs. Wallace I believed capable of any treachery.

After a while I remarked that all the men and boys about the livery stable smiled significantly when my master came in; and by and by, when he was out, I heard them saying among themselves that he was going to marry Miss Winters.

Remembering the past as I did, I was sure they were mistaken; but still the way Dr. Fred had done had somewhat shaken my confidence in men. Indeed, I worried not a little, and one day when my master announced that he was going to Chicago for some weeks, I could not decide whether the move meant bad or ill. The last thing before starting he caressed me and whispered loving words in my ear. Surely he could not do that, I thought, if he were untrue.

It seemed a different world to me when he was gone. Mrs. Wallace and her sister used me continually, and I had no idea that women could be such merciless creatures.

They demanded that I trot all the time, up hill and down, and then kept up a continual nagging that made me quite frantic. My mouth was all sore and chafed from the ceaseless jerking and slashing of my back with the lines; and, no matter how strictly I obeyed them, it was all wrong.

Part of the time they rode on my back. The saddle did not fit me, and there was a rough place inside that wore a sore. Nobody noticed this, though; in fact, I was scarcely curried or rubbed at all. Every time the saddle went on my back I grew worse, until one day the pain became unendurable and I ran away.

Think of me, Dandy, running away! I left Miss Minnie in a heap by a roadside, but on I went, that wretched saddle tearing deeper into me every moment.

Somebody saw me, and called out:

"Dr. Dick's Dandy running away, as I live!"

This seemed to bring me to my senses, and when they yelled, "Whoa," I stopped. I was all of a tremble. They led me back till they came to Minnie, crying by the roadside and rearranging her hair. At first she refused to get into the saddle again, and I hoped she'd hold out, but she didn't, and I had all I could do to keep from running again, her weight hurt that sore so.

The next day we went again, with Park on Prince for escort. The saddle hurt as badly as before—worse, I guess—and presently, when they undertook a race, the torture was too much, and I reared, throwing my lady off again. Park caught the bridle with a jerk that almost threw me to the ground, and while I was recovering myself he slid from his horse. Tying the latter by the roadside, he removed the saddle, and proceeded to give me the dreadfulest whipping, with the whip he carried.

I had never been really whipped before in my life, and I scarcely know which hurt me the worst, the lash or the injustice and humiliation; probably the lash, though, for it cut mercilessly into the sore.

Suddenly Minnie screamed:

"Don't, don't, Park; just see the blood! Oh, what will the doctor say?"

But the young man was mad, I suppose; anyway he thrashed away until he was tired.

Sobbing hysterically, Minnie wiped the blood from my back with her handkerchief, and refused to mount again. They had a quarrel, but I was too faint and sore to pay much attention.

And to think I could never tell my Master one word about it. That was four days before he came home, and I was not out of the stable again.

Dr. Fred came in the morning after my whipping, examined my back and swore frightfully. Said he'd a notion to horsewhip Park, and promised him his dismissal when Master came home. It all tended to make the fellow ugly, and every one of the Wallace horses have cause to remember those four days. They seemed a veritable reign of terror.

All the while he was putting something on my back that smarted it dreadfully.

Of course, Dr. Dick visited my stall the first thing. I laid my head on his shoulder and could have cried with relief. The moment he moved away I would recall him with a whinny, and he finally led me out with his own hands for some water.

That spot on my back was the first thing to catch his eye in the perfect light, but Park was ready with a plausible story about Minnie trying a side-saddle on me "just because I needed exercise," and it rubbed my back.

That was all. I never heard any more about it, except that Master pitied and petted me even more than before. Thinking of the thousands upon thousands of poor creatures that are abused much worse every day, and never receive a kind word or pat, I felt that my lines were cast in pleasant places.

Anyway I never heard any more about Master marrying Miss Winters, and after awhile she went away.

Just prior to this last event, she and Mrs. Wallace drove out with me, and I heard the former say: "I hate Dandy, I believe I am jealous of him."

Such a pretty dapple gray was brought into the barn one night, her back one mass of ridges made by a whip.

"What a shame!" one of the stable men said, "and she's a willing piece of horseflesh too."

"Yes," said another, "but some fellows think it looks big to whip like that; shows their power and importance."

"Shows they're —— fools!"

CHAPTER X.

At stated times buyers came down, and people from all through the country brought in their horses, cattle, sheep and hogs. Of course, one set of buyers did not deal in all these, but there were horse buyers, cattle buyers and so on.

When the horse buyers were coming, our barn, and even the sheds outside, used to be full of horses, many of them already sad and homesick.

People may think that dumb animals cannot be homesick, but I tell you they can. All there is of life, for the average domestic creature, is the comfort it takes resting at night in a familiar place, and eating and drinking where it is accustomed. We have few joys, and the future holds no hope. A familiar voice, even though an abusive one, is dear to us.

I have seen dogs cringe and fawn on most inhuman wretches because they acknowledge them as their masters, and so it is, in a less degree, with almost all of us.

Soon after Master came home from Chicago there were an unusual number of horses and men in need of accommodation, and about twenty of the latter slept in the haymow. In the evening they all sat talking overhead, and it so happened that I could hear their conversation.

"I tell you I kinder hate to sell them there black ponies o' mine," said one. "I've raised them from colts, and I think a heap of 'em, but I've got to have money to raise that mortgage, and it's the only way."

"Jest the way I feel about them there bays 'o mine," put in another, "and I can't help fearin' they will fall into hard hands."

"It is kinder rough," said number three, "to think of fetchin' 'em right away from their homes where they been fer so long, 'nd turnin' 'em out amongst perfect strangers to be taken, land only knows where. How would we feel if it were us or our children?"

"Horses don't sense sech things ez we would," said another.

"Don't ye fool yerself, Billy, they do. I raised a fine colt onct, kept her till she was nine years old, then sold her to a man twenty miles away. He came for her, 'nd when he went to take her she seemed to know she wasn't jist lent or hired, and such mournful whinnying I never heard before nor since. She was always such a willing creature, but then she pulled back and all but balked. My, how the children cried 'nd took on! I felt myself as if I'd committed a crime. Well, do you think when I got up in the morning that creature was back in her old stall, tired and muddy, but jest as happy! She had traveled the forty miles and was home again.

"The next day the man came again. She resisted and plead harder than ever, but of course he took her. He shut her in safely that time. Six months after he was driving by our place when she set up sech a neighing, and, despite his best efforts, she turned in at the gate. I went out and she acted so tickled. I persuaded him to stop to dinner, and I assure you she was bountifully cared for in her old stall.

"She again left reluctantly. Three or four months later, she got out of her pasture and came home. Five years after she came again; and the queerest thing was, she hadn't forgotten us a bit. It always makes me blue to think what she had suffered from pure homesickness in those years."

"That 'minds me," said another man, "of a big gray horse my daughter used to own. She sold sewing machines, and drove the animal nearly every day for two or three years; then she sold him.

"It was, maybe, two years after that, that she was crossing a pasture one day, when she saw a big gray horse making swiftly towards her. It scared her a bit at first, but when he neighed she knew it was old Jim. Would you believe he came straight to her, and laid his head on her shoulder? If that ain't memory and affection for ye, what is it?"

"Yes, 'nd the wonder is that folks ain't better to 'em than they be. They get mighty rough used some times. I knew a man down East; he purtended to be a sort of a preacher, too, that used to pound his horses fer just what was his own fault. One day he overloaded 'em, 'nd because they couldn't pull up a steep place he got back of 'em 'nd jabbed 'em with the tines o' a pitchfork till the blood jest trickled down. At another time he got mad at one of 'em, 'nd, taking her out of the harness, beat her till he knocked her down, then he hitched the other horse to her and made him drag her all over a stony, rough pasture. When the neighbors see him, the trail her body made was marked with blood. There was a fuss, but he let 'em know he'd do as he pleased with his own. Her side was all tore to pieces, 'nd, after sufferin' a while, she died."

"I see a fellow jest last week," put in another, "knock his horse down; then, because she couldn't get up, he kicked an eye out."

"Mercy on us!" cried the first speaker, "if I thought them 'ere black ponies of mine would ever fall into such hands, I'd take 'em home 'nd let the blamed mortgage foreclose."

"There's no tellin'," answered another.

"Well, I'm sellin'," said still another, "because I'm afraid my horse is getting the poll evil, 'nd I've had one trial of that."

"It ain't hard to cure; take it in time," said another. "I've cured several."

"Well, I'd like to see it done," said the other. "I tried everything far and near, 'nd she jest got worse. Some of the things jest made her crazy. Onct she started and walked a dozen miles before she knew what she was doin', I guess, poor thing!"

"Well, you see, poll evil generally comes from a blow on the head, or from the wearin' of a heavy bridle, and if taken in time, and the cause removed, the treatment ain't much, just rubbin' in arnica. But if matter forms, then something else has to be done. I, fer one, don't believe in a raw hand choppin' into horseflesh no more'n human flesh. Get somebody that's used to the business to cut open the hard swellin' 'nd put in lint saterated in glycerine, calendula 'nd water. Put iled silk over this 'nd fix a linen hood over, leavin' places fer the ears. Tie it under the throat, and wet it three or four times a day with the same stuff ye put in the opening. If the lump gets soft, the doctor kin open it 'nd let the stuff out, cleanin' it all out careful. Sometimes they say it ain't safe to open 'em, 'nd they inject weak sulphate of zinc—ounce a day. When the matter gets thick 'nd white it's better to inject the glycerine, calendula and water again. The animal needs care 'nd tonin' up."

"There is getting to be less poll evil than there used to be," some one remarked.

"Yes, since new barns with high doors have taken the place of the old, low log stables; and we use lighter bridles."

It was with a heavy heart that I saw the poor horses hurried off in the morning, but it made me feel better toward men that some of the owners looked sad and gave a kindly parting pat.

Master had to make an early trip, and it so happened that we were passing the depot when the poor creatures were being driven into the car. Strange surroundings, strange voices, strange everything! I thought of the story the mustangs told, and wondered if these horses would fare better or worse.

Presently we overtook a pedestrian, and Master invited him to ride. I soon discovered that the latter's mind was full of the same subject that filled mine.

"I tell you, Martin, I wish there were mercy shown the dumb beasts. Of course, we have to buy and sell and all that, but things are at a fearful pass, especially on railroads and in large cities. I never realized it as I did while I was in Chicago a few weeks ago, and the scenes I saw there have haunted me ever since.

"Carload after carload of wretched-looking cattle were brought to the stock yards, having come thousands of miles, some of them without one drop of water. It turned me faint, used as I am to suffering, to see the piteous pleading in their sunken, frightened eyes. Great heavens, it was a sight to remember!

"And then the way they unloaded them! There were thousands of them, and people were in a hurry. The poor beasts, weak and terrified as they were, did their best to obey the rough, unintelligible orders, but assistance (?) was inhumanly rendered by the men using heavy poles with great iron spikes in the end. Prod, prod, prod! time and again the cruel iron pierced the hide and buried itself in their quivering flesh. The air was full of the cries and moans of fright and pain. Many were hauled out dead or dying. Something of what they endured may be conceived when one witnesses their frantic greed for water. It is terrible to think of the torturing thirst that had lasted for days.

"I tell you, man, there's a day of reckoning coming when men will cry unto the mountains and hills to fall on them and hide them."

"But why do they abuse them so? Water is plentiful," Martin asked.

"Well, I suppose it saves time and trouble, but the main reason is greed. They starve them for water, then give them a chance to drink all they want just before they are weighed, thus increasing their weight dishonestly. Then, when Saturday night comes, the water is shut off, and the poor animals in the stockyards get no more until Monday; and of all dreary, hot, dusty places on earth those stockyards take the lead.

"But the worst of all is the cruelties of the slaughter houses. Hundreds of cattle crowded around awaiting their turn to be butchered, and gazing with staring eyes at their mates' bloody fate. You know how the smell of blood terrifies such creatures. Their whole systems are doubtless poisoned with the agony. Such meat cannot be healthy.

"Now there could be humane means devised for all these proceedings if only men cared."

"If only they cared," echoed Martin, much impressed by Master's words.

CHAPTER XI.

One autumn Master determined to "go West." Why he went I do not know, but he was to stay "some months," they said. How I did hope he would take me along, but he did not.

"Be kind to Dandy," was his parting injunction, as usual, to Herman, the man who had succeeded Park Winters as hostler.

Of course, I did not know what going West means, and could not think that "some months" were longer than the time he had spent in Chicago.

The morning he started he came into my stall and talked to me a long while. Among other things he said: "Be a good boy, Dandy, and when I come home we'll go and live at the farm—you and I."

I did miss him so! The days were all dreary, and I dreaded to go to sleep at night, because I would be obliged to awake to a fresh sense of my loss.

I cannot begin to give all my experience during his absence, but will note a few instances. Of a truth, I realized as never before what it is to be a horse.

Dr. and Mrs. Wallace were not a happy couple. The latter was less outspoken than in the early days of her married life, but she was equally as self-willed, only more cunning and underhanded about it. Fred drank all the time, but people could not ordinarily tell when he was intoxicated. The barn boys said he could "carry a good deal."

The two boys, Chet and Carm, were wild and lawless. The former was smart and a great student, though. Poor Carm, better but weaker, was always in disgrace. His teacher and father called him a "numbskull," and gradually the latter came to indulge Chet in everything and deny Carm just as prodigally.

There were two other children in the house now—Tommy and Elizabeth, or "Bobby," as the little girl called herself, and others fell into the habit.

I liked Bobby from the time Master first held the little yellow-haired creature on my back, for a ride; and she always clapped her little hands on seeing me, and cried, "Dandy! Dandy!"

I liked her for herself, and also because Dr. Dick loved her. It did me good to know that he had this little child to pet and think about.

Things went well enough for a week or so after Master left, then Chet began to drive me.

Sometimes when the doctor would use me for a long drive in the day, soon after dark, while I was yet eating my supper, the boy, with some companion, would come into the barn and put my harness on. Herman would object, and there would be a fuss between them, always ending in my being hitched in a buggy or road-cart and driven out.

It was the second time that this occurred that I discovered that Chet was under the influence of liquor, as was also his companion, and they carried bottles with them. Chet used the whip freely, and I went as fast as I could; but the oftener they touched those bottles the harder they drove. After what seemed to me hours of agony, they pulled up before a brilliantly lighted old building out in the country, hitched me and staggered in.

The wind was raw and cold, and the sweat pouring off me. I surely thought Chet would remember my blanket, but he didn't, and there I had to stand one, two, three, four or more dreadful hours. Long before they came out I was alternately chilling and burning. I ached and trembled.

They drove home as fast as they came, whipping nearly all the way, though I was doing my best.

Herman swore profusely (people did not do that around the barn when Master was home) as he rubbed me down rapidly with a coarse cloth before blanketing me closely.

How I felt!

And thirsty—it did seem I must have water or choke, but he gave me none for some reason.

By morning I was so stiff I could scarcely move, my breath was short and came hard, and my skin was hot.

Dr. Fred ordered me early.

"I don't think Dandy is able to go out, sir, to-day," Herman replied. "The young gentlemen had him out all night almost, and he is all stiffened up."

Dr. Fred muttered something and ordered out the bays, calling out to Herman, as he drove off, to get Dr. Dick's box of horse medicine and give me aconite—two-drop doses of the tincture every two hours—until the fever was gone; then to alternate bryonia, and thus according to directions given in the book with the box.

I noticed that I began to feel better pretty soon, and by afternoon Mrs. Wallace said she wanted me hitched up. Herman demurred, but had to finally give in. I was as stiff as ever when I got home again.

That very night Chet harnessed me again, despite Herman's angry protest, and drove me ten miles. If only he had taken the trouble to look in my eyes, I am sure he must have seen how wretched I felt. This time he carelessly threw a blanket over me, but did not buckle it over my chest, and in a little while the wind had blown it half off me. It would have been entirely off—and it might as well have been—but for a corner catching on the top of the collar. That time gray was showing in the east before he started for home.

With vile, profane words he bade me "Get up," emphasizing by stinging blows of the whip, saying to his companion that he must make the ten miles before his father was up.

I suppose no man was ever compelled to stand tied to a post all night; if there had, he would surely be going up and down the earth preaching mercy and justice to those who have the power over horses.

Another thing that made that night especially wearing was the fact that I was tied short, and my front feet were much lower than my back ones. Such a strain as I was on!

It does seem that horses deserve the little consideration necessary to tie them in a decent spot. I have heard many of my kind speak of this matter. In some villages the hitching places along the sidewalks are most uncomfortable, the animals being obliged to stand on a twist, ofttimes with the front feet lower and in a mud puddle.

Is it any wonder we sometimes protest by vigorously pawing the sidewalks, if we can reach them?

Give us fair play.

Well, I was too lame to get out at all, after that night, for a week. I had rheumatism. Had Master been there to treat me, I might have recovered, but Herman knew nothing about horse-doctoring, and so it ran on. If I did get a little better, it was only to be overdriven and exposed. Another time there was to be a horse-race five miles off, and Chet drove Prince and I in the buggy.

Then I found out how it hurts a heavy-bodied, short-legged horse to be driven with a light-bodied, long-limbed one. He drove, as usual, just as fast as he could make us go, uphill and down the same. More than once I thought I should fall, and by the time he stopped I was whiter than even nature intended me to be, being covered with foam.

Prince was not nearly so tired, but he said it irritated and fretted him to be driven with a horse of my build.

It was only a little country horse-race, and the animals were chiefly working ones with neither inclination, strength nor training for the race-track.

The men were wild with excitement, and betting was going on all around.

After a while three men got on their horses' backs and started. The crowd yelled and clapped their hands; the riders buried the cruel spurs in the horses' sides, and leaned as far forward as possible.

Of course, some one had to beat, and it was a long-legged, bony creature that won the first heat.

Three times the same ones ran, and twice the long-legged one won, but the others had done their best; yes, more than that, I may say.

Poor things! there they stood, sweat and blood covering their sides, every nerve and muscle overstrained, and their masters cursing them for their defeat. The entire afternoon was consumed in this manner. Among others Prince was taken on the track. I knew by his eye, and the poise of his head he did not like it, but he behaved nicely until a cruel-looking fellow got on his back and dug the rowels in; with one bound he was off, and the rider had hard work to keep his seat. He won the heat, and I was scarcely enjoying his victory when, quick as a flash, he reached out and catching the fellow by the shoulder flung him headlong some feet away.

Some one caught the bridle strap, and, as soon as the fellow could pick himself up, he flew at the offender, dealing him a blow between the eyes with a club chancing to be handy.

"Hold on!" Chet cried, but another, and another blow followed. My noble gray friend staggered, gathered up, staggered again, then fell. A half-dozen convulsive shivers passed over his frame and he was dead.

In a fury of anger and terror the young master sprang upon Prince's slayer. They grappled, but strong hands separated them, and Chet had only to put my harness in the buggy, get on my back and ride sorrowfully homeward.

Dr. Fred was in a temper, to be sure, and immediately had an officer after the man who had killed his horse.

All night and, for many nights, I could not close my eyes without seeming to see poor Prince in the death-throes, and all because he dared to resent unfair treatment. I heard Herman say that the fellow had paid for the horse, that Chet and his father had had a quarrel, and that Mrs. Wallace insisted on the former leaving home.

"Yes, she's mighty keen fer the first woman's boys to leave home," remarked an old man who worked around the barn. "She's wantin' 'em out of the way so her young uns 'll git the property."

"Guess there won't be enough to fight over if Dr. Dick stays away long," Herman replied.

Speaking of horse-races reminds me to say that if all race-horses, or those that are made to run, could tell their stories they would fill volumes with tales of injustice and suffering. All animals will, if humanely treated, do their best for their masters; but a kind word and reassuring pat will go much further toward winning a race than all the spurs and curses in the world.

Many a race has been lost through the very efforts made to win it.

Coolness and self-possession are indispensable in both horse and rider.

I remember of being at a State fair with my master some years later, and witnessing a race. Among the competitors was a handsome little black horse, all grit and goodness, but, owing to its owner being partly intoxicated, it lost the stake, in consequence incurring his wrath. And how he did pound the noble little beast!

A number of disapprovals arose from the multitude, but no one ventured to interfere.

The animal was his, you know.