How Deacon Tubman and Parson Whitney Kept New Years | Page 6

"that's all we are, either of us," and, laughing as
merrily as boys, the two glided away in the sleigh.
[Illustration: "_It was found that the parson could steer a sled._"]
Well, perhaps they didn't have fun that day--those two old boys that
had started out with the feeling that they were "only sixteen," and
bound to make "a day of it." And they did make a day of it, in fact, and
such a day as neither had had for forty years. For, first, they went to
Bartlett's hill, where the boys and girls were coasting, and coasted with
them for a full hour; and then it was discovered by the younger portion
of his flock that the parson was not an old, stiff, solemn, surly poke, as
they had thought, but a pleasant, good-natured, kindly soul, who could
take and give a joke and steer a sled as well as the smartest boy in the
crowd; and when it came to snow-balling, he could send a ball further
than Bill Sykes himself, who could out-throw any boy in town, and roll
up a bigger block to the new snow fort they were building than any
three boys among them. And how the parson enjoyed being a boy again!
How exhilarating the slide down the steep hill; how invigorating the
pure, cool air; how pleasant the noise of the chatting and joking going
on around him; how bright and sweet the boys and girls looked, with
their rosy cheeks and sparkling eyes; how the old parson's heart thrilled
as they crowded around him when he would go, and urged him to stay;
and how little Alice Dorchester begged him, with her little arms around
his neck, to "jes stay and gib me one more slide."
[Illustration: "_Little Alice Dorchester begged him to stay._"]
"You never made such a pastoral call as that, parson," said the deacon,
as they drove away amid the cheers of the boys and the good-byes of
the girls, while the former fired off a volley of snowballs in his honor
and the latter waved their muffs and handkerchiefs after them.
"God bless them! God bless them!" said the parson. "They have lifted a
great load from my heart and taught me the sweetness of life, of youth
and the wisdom of Him who took the little ones in His arms and
blessed them. Ah, deacon," he added, "I've been a great fool, but I'll be

so, thank God, no more."
III
Now, old Jack was a horse of a great deal of character, and had a great
history, but of this none in that section, save the little deacon, knew a
word. Dick Tubman, the deacon's youngest, wildest, and, I might add,
favorite son, had purchased him of an impecunious jockey at the close
of a, to him, disastrous campaign, that cleaned him completely out and
left him in a strange city, a thousand miles from home, with nothing but
the horse, harness and sulky, and a list of unpaid bills that must be met
before he could leave the scene of his disastrous fortunes. Under such
circumstances it was that Dick Tubman ran across the horse and, partly
out of pity for its owner and partly out of admiration of the horse,
whose failure to win at the races was due more to his lack of condition
and the bad management of his jockey than lack of speed, bought him
off-hand and, having no use for him himself, shipped him as a present
to the deacon, with whom he had now been for four years, with no
harder work than plowing out the good old man's corn in the summer,
and jogging along the country roads on the deacon's errands. Having
said this much of the horse, perhaps I should more particularly describe
him.
[Illustration: "_Old Jack was a horse of a great deal of character._"]
He was, in sooth, an animal of most unique and extraordinary
appearance. For, in the first place, he was quite seventeen hands in
height and long in proportion. He was also the reverse of shapely in the
fashion of his build, for his head was long and bony and his hip bones
sharp and protuberant; his tail was what is known among horsemen as a
"rat tail," being but scantily covered with hair, and his neck was even
more scantily supplied with a mane; while in color he could easily have
taken any premium put up for homeliness, being an ashen roan, mottled
with black and patches of divers hue. But his legs were flat and corded
like a racer's, his neck long and thin as a thoroughbred's, his nostrils
large, his ears sharply pointed and lively, while the white rings around
his eyes hinted at a cross, somewhere