That was a severe winter, with plenty of snow and ice after the middle
of December. How I did enjoy skimming over the smooth roads, with Master
in the light cutter behind me, and the merry jingle of the bells keeping
time to my flying footsteps. No matter how great the hurry when we
stopped, he never neglected to blanket me, and blanketing with him does
not mean merely to throw a robe or blanket loosely over a horse's back,
but it means to put a thick covering that buttons or buckles over the
chest and far up onto the neck. He grows righteously indignant every
time he gets to speaking of people who think their duty done when the
back of an animal is protected, while the part containing the lungs,
etc.--the most delicate, susceptible part of the horse's anatomy--is
left exposed to the pitiless blast.
My doctor is one of the few sensible, consistent men in the world;
heaven bless him!
My heart always aches for the thin, neglected animals, many of them
without even the pretense of a blanket, that stand for hours shivering
in the wind and storm. The man who will button his own warm coat around
him and hurry indoors, leaving his helpless servants tied unprotected
outside, must have a heart of flint.
One day the humane blacksmith came to Master and told him he thought
something had ought to be done. That he had just found out that a span
of horses had stood in an old shed, belonging to a saloon, for two whole
days and nights, the week before, with neither food nor water. The owner
was on a protracted spree. Dr. Dick was furious. He never shows anger
excepting under some such circumstance as this. He immediately wrote two
letters, one to the saloon-keeper and the other to the man who had
neglected the team, boldly signing his name and warning them not to
repeat or be party to such an offence again.
Further than this, between himself and the smith, the sheds and alleys
of the little town were closely watched.
Several times in daylight, when Master knew that animals had stood for
hours unfed and unwatered, he would send Bob to untie them and bring
them to our barn. There they would be rubbed and cared for, then
returned to their post; and as fast as our blankets grew shabby he found
some poor, shivering beast whose back needed them.
One day while Bob was unhitching a sorry-looking horse that had stood
unprotected and uncared for for eight hours in a cold wind, the owner
rushed out of the saloon and began a tipsy tirade, threatening to have
the youth arrested for horse-stealing if he dared take the creature a
foot.
Bob came home to report. Dr. Fred bade him mind his own business and let
other people's property alone.
Dr. Dick told him that so long as a man did not abuse his property, he
proposed to let it alone; but that when a living creature was being
imposed on and abused, that he had a right--a God-given right--to
interfere, so long as he did not injure the man or make him poorer.
Fred had been drinking a little himself, and becoming furious, shook his
fist in Master's face and called him hard names. The latter, without
replying, turned away and bade Bob attend to the work at home. Supposing
that he had won the day, Fred strutted off to the house. No sooner was
he indoors than Dr. Dick was striding down street, and in ten minutes
more the half-frozen subject of the trouble was being rubbed and fed in
the stall to the right of mine.
When the animal was finishing her oats the owner came swearing in.
Expecting something of the kind, Master was on hand. I can't begin to
tell you all he said to that poor, drunken wretch, but it was a sermon,
a temperance lecture, and a humane plea all in one. When the fellow went
away he seemed pretty well sobered and ashamed, and even thanked Master
for his kindness and promised to use the blanket given and go right
straight home.
"Dr. Dick is a queer un," Bob remarked to a neighbor lad to whom he
related the incident later. "Most folks let on they hain't no right to
meddle with what they call other people's affairs, but I guess it's more
'cause they're too lazy and cowardly. He says he ain't afeard of devil
nor man, but is afeard of doin' wrong. Now, ain't he queer?"
"I should snicker!" replied the other emphatically, not looking in the
least inclined to do so, though. I suppose it was his way of saying yes.
What do you think?
In spite of all the family could say Dr. Fred sold Ross toward spring. I
shall never forget the look of sadness in the poor old fellow's eyes,
and the mournful whinny he gave as he turned his head at the barn door
and looked back at the empty stall. It happened that the man who bought
him came for him when both doctors, the bays and Bob were away. The
little boys were playing in the barn.
"I've come for the old horse I bought," he said.
"It's that 'un," Chet answered, pointing to Ross, so we knew there was
no mistake. I called after him as long as I could make him hear.
He said he wished he could die, that there was never a moment that he
was not in pain. He had stringhalt, I think, and Dr. Fred said he was
getting less worth every day and after awhile would not be fit to
travel.
Master said, better put him out of his misery, then, but he belonged to
Fred, so that settled it.
Before I forget it, I want to tell of a former mate of Ross that he used
to talk about.
His name was Billy. They belonged to a very passionate man, who, when he
became excited, would pound them unmercifully. Some little thing went
wrong one day, nothing that the team was to blame for, and the man dealt
Billy several blows on the head with a linch-pin. He staggered, and the
man, fearing he had killed him, cooled down and quickly brought some
water, giving him some to drink and pouring some on his head. This
seemed to help him and he worked on all day. Before morning, though,
Ross said the animal woke him, but received no answer, only groans and
queer sounds. By this time Billy had knocked down the thin partition
between their stalls and was dealing him some terrible blows with his
heels. He crept as far away as he could and longed for daylight. When it
came Billy lay on the floor bruised, exhausted and almost choked from
the wrenching of the halter strap.
As far as he could reach in every direction things were demolished.
The owner seemed much frightened when he came out, and at once put a boy
on Ross to go for a veterinary. The latter, after an examination, asked
if any blow had been given on the head. Shamefacedly the master
acknowledged the truth.
"Well," replied the other, "if you got any satisfaction out of it at the
time it is all you ever will get. This horse is ruined. There is
inflammation of the brain. He may get better, but I think he will have
one or two more spells of delirium and then die. It is something similar
to mad staggers."
They bled the horse [I am so glad that the barbarous notion of
blood-letting is a thing of the past] and put some cloths wet in cold
water on his head. He seemed to get better and was put to work again,
but a week or so later, while plowing corn in the hot sun, another
attack came on, and rearing, he fell backward, narrowly missing crushing
his master. When better again, he was taken some distance from home and
sold.
Some two years passed and Ross himself had changed hands, when one day
as he was standing tied to a post before a country grocery, a weary,
shabby-looking horse near him asked if he did not know him.
"It's Billy's voice," said Ross, "but this never can be Billy."
"But it is," said the other, mournfully, "or what is left of him; I'm
pretty well used up."
Then he told how he had passed from hand to hand and something of his
bodily sufferings. He had been experimented on by every quack in the
country, but each augmented his torture.
"One man," he said, "helped me. He was kind and gentle; never yelled at
me (oh, how I wish they knew how noise hurts my head!) and always gave
me water every hour through the day, and left it where I could reach it
at night. Sometimes cold water throws off a fit. He used to work me
early and late in the day, but through the hot part kept me in the
shade. He also used cold pads on my head and gave me pills of
belladonna, one or two a day, when my head was hot and my eyes red. He
sometimes gave aconite, too; and when I had been in the sun, gelseminum
was the remedy. I think I might have recovered had he lived, but when I
had been there four months he died, and soon I was sold and abused worse
than ever. Strange, how we dumb brutes can linger and suffer!"
Ross never saw him again, and often wondered if he still lived.
Dr. Fred soon bought a new horse--a gay fellow, with wicked eyes and a
temper to match. His name was Prince. He was a well-built, dark
iron-gray about eight years old.
"He's mighty nervous!" commented Bob. "Jest acts as if he expected me to
hit or kick him every time I come round him, 'nd jerks his head back if
I so much as put my hand on the manger. He's ugly, too, fer he lays his
ears back and shows his teeth mighty frequent."
Our stalls were so far apart that we could not talk much, so I knew
almost nothing about him until one morning Bob put me in one sleigh for
Master and Prince in another for Dr. Fred.
Such a time as the boy had to get that horse hitched up. He would not
stand, and was rearing and jerking the whole time.
"Ain't he a beauty?" cried Dr. Fred, proudly. "Most too much of a horse
for you to manage, ain't he, Bob? Here, Prince, be quiet, sir!" The
animal quieted a little and looked at him.
"See, he minds me. You must use authority in your tone when--" but the
sentence never was finished, for just at that moment the "beauty"
reached out and caught his admirer by the shoulder, lifting him off his
feet at the first shake.
Then there was a scene! That brute shook his master as a cat would a
rat, despite the frantic blows dealt by Fred's left hand and Bob's
vigorous fists. Dr. Dick was in the office, but the noise drew him
barely in time to see his brother flung a dozen feet or more into a
snowdrift.
I am afraid that Master smiled, it seemed so to me, anyway; but he, of
course, rushed to the rescue.
No sooner did Fred get on his feet than he flew at that horse with the
butt of a riding whip, raining down the blows alike on the face, over
the head, anywhere he could strike in his wild anger.
"I'll teach you, you wretch! I'll make you suffer!" and kindred remarks,
shot explosively from his mouth.
Master, white to the lips, now interfered, but only conquered by
superior muscle, for Fred was crazed with pain and anger. Of course, had
he been a horse he would have had to endure ten times as much suffering
and injustice quietly, but he was a man and bent on revenge. I do not
think Prince did right, indeed he did very wrong, but he had far less
than most horses have to endure. Oft-times I had seen Dr. Fred strike
Ross or the bays for nothing at all; simply he was out of sorts, so I
could not pity him much.
"Don't call the entire neighborhood together," said Master, "you are
acting very silly! Go in the house and have Nannie bathe your shoulder,
and I will try the new horse awhile. Bob, you may put Dandy back."
After considerable more fuss Fred limped off to the house and Dr. Dick
stepped to Prince's head. Back went the latter's ears and his lips
quivered. Calmly Master looked him in the eye, then began stroking his
face and talking to him. He gradually quieted down, but his glance was
both treacherous and distrustful.