Buying a Horse | Page 8

moved about the room and
looked at the Hispano-Roman pictures; they had a glass of sherry; from
time to time something was casually murmured about Frank. My friend
felt that he was in good hands, and left the affair to them. It ended in a
visit to the stable, where it appeared that this gentleman had no horse to
sell among his hundred which exactly met my friend's want, but that he
proposed to lend him Frank while a certain other animal was put in
training for the difficult office he required of a horse. One of the men
was sent for Frank, and in the mean time my friend was shown some
gaunt and graceful thoroughbreds, and taught to see the difference
between them and the plebeian horse. But Frank, though no
thoroughbred, eclipsed these patricians when he came. He had a little
head, and a neck gallantly arched; he was black and plump and smooth,

and though he carried himself with a petted air, and was a dandy to the
tips of his hooves, his knowing eye was kindly. He turned it upon my
friend with the effect of understanding his case at a glance.
It was in this way that for the rest of the long, lovely summer peace was
re-established in his heart. There was no question of buying or selling
Frank; there were associations that endeared him beyond money to his
owner; but my friend could take him without price. The situation had
its humiliation for a man who had been arrogantly trying to buy a horse,
but he submitted with grateful meekness, and with what grace Heaven
granted him; and Frank gayly entered upon the peculiar duties of his
position. His first duty was to upset all preconceived notions of the
advantage of youth in a horse. Frank was not merely not coming seven
or nine, but his age was an even number,--he was sixteen; and it was
his owner's theory, which Frank supported, that if a horse was well
used he was a good horse till twenty-five.
The truth is that Frank looked like a young horse; he was a dandy
without any of the ghastliness which attends the preservation of youth
in old beaux of another species. When my friend drove him in the
rehabilitated phaeton he felt that the turn-out was stylish, and he
learned to consult certain eccentricities of Frank's in the satisfaction of
his pride. One of these was a high reluctance to be passed on the road.
Frank was as lazy a horse--but lazy in a self-respectful, æsthetic
way--as ever was; yet if he heard a vehicle at no matter how great
distance behind him (and he always heard it before his driver), he
brightened with resolution and defiance, and struck out with speed that
made competition difficult. If my friend found that the horse behind
was likely to pass Frank, he made a merit of holding him in. If they met
a team, he lay back in his phaeton, and affected not to care to be going
faster than a walk, any way.
One of the things for which he chiefly prized Frank was his skill in
backing and turning. He is one of those men who become greatly
perturbed when required to back and turn a vehicle; he cannot tell (till
too late) whether he ought to pull the right rein in order to back to the
left, or vice versa; he knows, indeed, the principle, but he becomes

paralyzed in its application. Frank never was embarrassed, never
confused. My friend had but to say, "Back, Frank!" and Frank knew
from the nature of the ground how far to back and which way to turn.
He has thus extricated my friend from positions in which it appeared to
him that no earthly power could relieve him.
In going up hill Frank knew just when to give himself a rest, and at
what moment to join the party in looking about and enjoying the
prospect. He was also an adept in scratching off flies, and had a
precision in reaching an insect anywhere in his van with one of his rear
hooves which few of us attain in slapping mosquitoes. This action
sometimes disquieted persons in the phaeton, but Frank knew perfectly
well what he was about, and if harm had happened to the people under
his charge my friend was sure that Frank could have done anything
short of applying arnica and telegraphing to their friends. His varied
knowledge of life and his long experience had satisfied him that there
were very few things to be afraid of in this world. Such womanish
weaknesses as shying and starting were far from him, and he regarded
the boisterous behavior of locomotives with indifference. He had not,
indeed, the virtue