Buying a Horse | Page 9

of one horse offered to my friend's purchase, of
standing, unmoved, with his nose against a passing express train; but he
was certainly not afraid of the cars.
Frank was by no means what Mr. Emerson calls a mush of concession;
he was not merely amiable; he had his moments of self-assertion, his
touches of asperity. It was not safe to pat his nose, like the erring Billy's;
he was apt to bring his handsome teeth together in proximity to the
caressing hand with a sharp click and a sarcastic grin. Not that he ever
did, or ever would really bite. So, too, when left to stand long under
fly-haunted cover, he would start off afterwards with alarming
vehemence; and he objected to the saddle. On the only occasion when
any of my friend's family mounted him, he trotted gayly over the grass
towards the house, with the young gentleman on his back; then, without
warning, he stopped short, a slight tremor appeared to pass over him,
and his rider continued the excursion some ten feet farther, alighting
lump-wise on a bunch of soft turf which Frank had selected for his
reception.

The summer passed, and in the comfort of Frank's possession my friend
had almost abandoned the idea of ever returning him to his owner. He
had thoughts of making the loan permanent, as something on the whole
preferable to a purchase. The drives continued quite into December,
over roads as smooth and hard as any in June, and the air was delicious.
The first snow brought the suggestion of sleighing; but that cold
weather about Christmas dispersed these gay thoughts, and restored my
friend to virtue. Word came from the stable that Frank's legs were
swelling from standing so long without going out, and my friend
resolved to part with an animal for which he had no use. I do not praise
him for this; it was no more than his duty; but I record his action in
order to account for the fact that he is again without a horse, and now,
with the opening of the fine weather, is beginning once more to think of
buying one.
But he is in no mood of arrogant confidence. He has satisfied himself
that neither love nor money is alone adequate to the acquisition: the
fates also must favor it. The horse which Frank's owner has had in
training may or may not be just the horse he wants. He does not know;
he humbly waits; and he trembles at the alternative of horses,
mystically summoned from space, and multitudinously advancing upon
him, parrot-mouthed, pony-gaited, tender for'a'd, and traveling wide
behind.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Buying a Horse, by William
Dean Howells
*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BUYING A
HORSE ***
***** This file should be named 23030-8.txt or 23030-8.zip *****
This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/0/3/23030/
Produced by Julia Miller, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced

from images generously made available by The Internet
Archive/American Libraries.)
Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be
renamed.
Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set
forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying
and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the
PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project
Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge
for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you do not
charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is
very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as
creation of derivative works, reports, performances and research. They
may be modified and printed and given away--you may do practically
ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to
the trademark license, especially commercial redistribution.

*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE PLEASE READ
THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work (or
any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
http://gutenberg.org/license).
Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project
Gutenberg-tm electronic works

1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the