Black Beauty The autobiography of a horse
a good and easy place but for circumstances of which he was ignorant. He
ordered the best hay with plenty of oats, crushed beans, and bran,
with vetches, or rye grass, as the man might think needful. I heard the
master give the order, so I knew there was plenty of good food, and I
thought I was well off.
For a few days all went on well. I found that my groom understood
his business. He kept the stable clean and airy, and he groomed me
thoroughly; and was never otherwise than gentle. He had been an hostler
in one of the great hotels in Bath. He had given that up, and now
cultivated fruit and vegetables for the market, and his wife bred and
fattened poultry and rabbits for sale. After awhile it seemed to me that
my oats came very short; I had the beans, but bran was mixed with them
instead of oats, of which there were very few; certainly not more than a
quarter of what there should have been. In two or three weeks this began
to tell upon my strength and spirits. The grass food, though very good,
was not the thing to keep up my condition without corn. However, I
could not complain, nor make known my wants. So it went on for about two
months; and I wondered that my master did not see that something was
the matter. However, one afternoon he rode out into the country to see a
friend of his, a gentleman farmer, who lived on the road to Wells.
This gentleman had a very quick eye for horses; and after he had
welcomed his friend he said, casting his eye over me:
“It seems to me, Barry, that your horse does not look so well as he did
when you first had him; has he been well?”
“Yes, I believe so,” said my master; “but he is not nearly so lively as
he was; my groom tells me that horses are always dull and weak in the
autumn, and that I must expect it.”
“Autumn, fiddlesticks!” said the farmer. “Why, this is only August; and
with your light work and good food he ought not to go down like this,
even if it was autumn. How do you feed him?”
My master told him. The other shook his head slowly, and began to feel
me over.
“I can't say who eats your corn, my dear fellow, but I am much mistaken
if your horse gets it. Have you ridden very fast?”
“No, very gently.”
“Then just put your hand here,” said he, passing his hand over my neck
and shoulder; “he is as warm and damp as a horse just come up from
grass. I advise you to look into your stable a little more. I hate to be
suspicious, and, thank heaven, I have no cause to be, for I can trust my
men, present or absent; but there are mean scoundrels, wicked enough to
rob a dumb beast of his food. You must look into it.” And turning to
his man, who had come to take me, “Give this horse a right good feed of
bruised oats, and don't stint him.”
“Dumb beasts!” Yes, we are; but if I could have spoken I could have told
my master where his oats went to. My groom used to come every morning
about six o'clock, and with him a little boy, who always had a covered
basket with him. He used to go with his father into the harness-room,
where the corn was kept, and I could see them, when the door stood ajar,
fill a little bag with oats out of the bin, and then he used to be off.
Five or six mornings after this, just as the boy had left the stable,
the door was pushed open, and a policeman walked in, holding the child
tight by the arm; another policeman followed, and locked the door on the
inside, saying, “Show me the place where your father keeps his rabbits'
food.”
The boy looked very frightened and began to cry; but there was no
escape, and he led the way to the corn-bin. Here the policeman found
another empty bag like that which was found full of oats in the boy's
basket.
Filcher was cleaning my feet at the time, but they soon saw him, and
though he blustered a good deal they walked him off to the “lock-up”,
and his boy with him. I heard afterward that the boy was not held to be
guilty, but the man was sentenced to prison for two months.
31 A Humbug
My master was not immediately suited, but in a few days my new groom
came. He was a tall, good-looking fellow enough; but if ever there was
a humbug in the shape of a groom Alfred Smirk was the man. He was very
civil to me, and never used me ill; in fact, he did a great deal of
stroking and patting when his master was there to see it. He always
brushed my mane and tail with water and my hoofs with oil before he
brought me to the door, to make me look smart; but as to cleaning my
feet or looking to my shoes, or grooming me thoroughly, he thought no
more of that than if I had been a cow. He left my bit rusty, my saddle
damp, and my crupper stiff.
Alfred Smirk considered himself very handsome; he spent a great deal of
time about his hair, whiskers and necktie, before a little looking-glass
in the harness-room. When his master was speaking to him it was always,
“Yes, sir; yes, sir”--touching his hat at every word; and every one
thought he was a very nice young man and that Mr. Barry was very
fortunate to meet with him. I should say he was the laziest, most
conceited fellow I ever came near. Of course, it was a great thing not
to be ill-used, but then a horse wants more than that. I had a loose
box, and might have been very comfortable if he had not been too
indolent to clean it out. He never took all the straw away, and the
smell from what lay underneath was very bad; while the strong vapors
that rose made my eyes smart and inflame, and I did not feel the same
appetite for my food.
One day his master came in and said, “Alfred, the stable smells rather
strong; should not you give that stall a good scrub and throw down
plenty of water?”
“Well, sir,” he said, touching his cap, “I'll do so if you please, sir;
but it is rather dangerous, sir, throwing down water in a horse's box;
they are very apt to take cold, sir. I should not like to do him an
injury, but I'll do it if you please, sir.”
“Well,” said his master, “I should not like him to take cold; but I
don't like the smell of this stable. Do you think the drains are all
right?”
“Well, sir, now you mention it, I think the drain does sometimes send
back a smell; there may be something wrong, sir.”
“Then send for the bricklayer and have it seen to,” said his master.
“Yes, sir, I will.”
The bricklayer came and pulled up a great many bricks, but found nothing
amiss; so he put down some lime and charged the master five shillings,
and the smell in my box was as bad as ever. But that was not all:
standing as I did on a quantity of moist straw my feet grew unhealthy
and tender, and the master used to say:
“I don't know what is the matter with this horse; he goes very
fumble-footed. I am sometimes afraid he will stumble.”
“Yes, sir,” said Alfred, “I have noticed the same myself, when I have
exercised him.”
Now the fact was that he hardly ever did exercise me, and when the
master was busy I often stood for days together without stretching my
legs at all, and yet being fed just as high as if I were at hard work.
This often disordered my health, and made me sometimes heavy and dull,
but more often restless and feverish. He never even gave me a meal
of green food or a bran mash, which would have cooled me, for he
was altogether as ignorant as he was conceited; and then, instead of
exercise or change of food, I had to take horse balls and draughts;
which, beside the nuisance of having them poured down my throat, used to
make me feel ill and uncomfortable.
One day my feet were so tender that, trotting over some fresh stones
with my master on my back, I made two such serious stumbles that, as he
came down Lansdown into the city, he stopped at the farrier's, and asked
him to see what was the matter with me. The man took up my feet one
by one and examined them; then standing up and dusting his hands one
against the other, he said:
“Your horse has got the 'thrush', and badly, too; his feet are very
tender; it is fortunate that he has not been down. I wonder your groom
has not seen to it before. This is the sort of thing we find in foul
stables, where the litter is never properly cleaned out. If you will
send him here to-morrow I will attend to the hoof, and I will direct
your man how to apply the liniment which I will give him.”
The next day I had my feet thoroughly cleansed and stuffed with tow
soaked in some strong lotion; and an unpleasant business it was.
The farrier ordered all the litter to be taken out of my box day by day,
and the floor kept very clean. Then I was to have bran mashes, a little
green food, and not so much corn, till my feet were well again. With
this treatment I soon regained my spirits; but Mr. Barry was so much
disgusted at being twice deceived by his grooms that he determined to
give up keeping a horse, and to hire when he wanted one. I was therefore
kept till my feet were quite sound, and was then sold again.
Part III
32 A Horse Fair
No doubt a horse fair is a very amusing place to those who have nothing
to lose; at any rate, there is plenty to see.
Long strings of young horses out of the country, fresh from the marshes;
and droves of shaggy little Welsh ponies, no higher than Merrylegs; and
hundreds of cart horses of all sorts, some of them with their long tails
braided up and tied with scarlet cord; and a good many like myself,
handsome and high-bred, but fallen into the middle class, through some
accident or blemish, unsoundness of wind, or some other complaint. There
were some splendid animals quite in their prime, and fit for anything;
they were throwing out their legs and showing off their paces in high
style, as they were trotted out with a leading rein, the groom running
by the side. But round in the background there were a number of poor
things, sadly broken down with hard work, with their knees knuckling
over and their hind legs swinging out at every step, and there were some
very dejected-looking old horses, with the under lip hanging down and
the ears lying back heavily, as if there were no more pleasure in life,
and no more hope; there were some so thin you might see all their ribs,
and some with old sores on their backs and hips. These were sad sights
for a horse to look upon, who knows not but he may come to the same
state.
There was a great deal of bargaining, of running up and beating down;
and if a horse may speak his mind so far as he understands, I should say
there were more lies told and more trickery at that horse fair than a
clever man could give an account of. I was put with two or three other
strong, useful-looking horses, and a good many people came to look at
us. The gentlemen always turned from me when they saw my broken knees;
though the man who had me swore it was only a slip in the stall.
The first thing was to pull my mouth open, then to look at my eyes, then
feel all the way down my legs, and give me a hard feel of the skin and
flesh, and then try my paces. It was wonderful what a difference there
was in the way these things were done. Some did it in a rough, offhand
way, as if one was only a piece of wood; while others would take their
hands gently over one's body, with a pat now and then, as much as to
say, “By your leave.” Of course I judged a good deal of the buyers by
their manners to myself.
There was one man, I thought, if he would buy me, I should be happy.
He was not a gentleman, nor yet one of the loud, flashy sort that call
themselves so. He was rather a small man, but well made, and quick in
all his motions. I knew in a moment by the way he handled me, that he
was used to horses; he spoke gently, and his gray eye had a kindly,
cheery look in it. It may seem strange to say--but it is true all the
same--that the clean, fresh smell there was about him made me take to
him; no smell of old beer and tobacco, which I hated, but a fresh smell