not be warranted free from vice, so nothing was said about that. My handsome appearance and good paces soon brought a gentleman to bid for me, and I was bought by another dealer; he tried me in all kinds of ways and with different bits, and soon found out what I could bear. At last he drove me quite without a bearing rein, and then sold me as a perfectly quiet horse to a gentleman in the country; he was a good master, and I was getting on very well, but his old groom left him and a new one came. This man was as hard-tempered and hard-handed as Samson; he always spoke in a rough, impatient voice, and if I did not move in the stall the moment he wanted me, he would hit me above the hocks with his stable broom or the fork, whichever he might have in his hand. Everything he did was rough, and I began to hate him; he wanted to make me afraid of him, but I was too high mettled for that; and one day when he had aggravated me more than usual, I bit him, which of course put him in a great rage, and he began to hit me about the head with a riding whip. After that, he never dared to come into my stall again, either my heels or my teeth were ready for him, and he knew it. I was quite quiet with my master, but of course he listened to what the man said, and so I was sold again.
‘The same dealer heard of me, and said he thought he knew one place where I should do well. “’Twas a pity,” he said, “that such a fine horse should go to the bad for want of a real good chance,” and the end of it was that I came here not long before you did; but I had then made up my mind that men were my natural enemies and that I must defend myself. Of course it is very different here, but who knows how long it will last? I wish I could think about things as you do; but I can’t after all I have gone through.’
‘Well,’ I said, ‘I think it would be a real shame if you were to bite or kick John or James.’
‘I don’t mean to,’ she said, ‘while they are good to me. I did bite James once pretty sharp, but John said, “Try her with kindness,” and instead of punishing me as I expected, James came to me with his arm bound up, and brought me a bran mash and stroked me; and I have never snapped at him since, and I won’t either.’
I was sorry for Ginger, but of course I knew very little then, and I thought most likely she made the worst of it; however, I found that as the weeks went on, she grew much more gentle and cheerful, and had lost the watchful, defiant look that she used to turn on any strange person who came near her; and one day James said, ‘I do believe that mare is getting fond of me, she quite whinnied after me this morning when I had been rubbing her forehead.’
‘Aye, aye, Jim, ’tis the Birtwick balls,’ said John, ‘she’ll be as good as Black Beauty by and by; kindness is all the physic she wants, poor thing!’ Master noticed the change too, and one day when he got out of the carriage and came to speak to us as he often did, he stroked her beautiful neck, ‘Well, my pretty one, well, how do things go with you now? you are a good bit happier than when you came to us, I think.’
She put her nose up to him in a friendly, trustful way, while he rubbed it gently.
‘We shall make a cure of her, John,’ he said.
‘Yes, sir, she’s wonderfully improved, she’s not the same creature that she was; it’s the Birtwick balls, sir,’ said John, laughing.
This was a little joke of John’s; he used to say that a regular course of the Birtwick horse-balls would cure almost any vicious horse; these balls, he said, were made up of patience and gentleness, firmness and petting, one pound of each to be mixed up with half-a-pint of common-sense, and given to the horse every day.
Mr Blomefield, the Vicar, had a large family of boys and girls; sometimes they used to come and play with Miss Jessie and Flora. One of the girls was as old as Miss Jessie; two of the boys were older, and there were several little ones. When they came, there was plenty of work for Merrylegs, for nothing pleased them so much as getting on him by turns and riding him all about the orchard and the home paddock, and this they would do by the hour together.
One afternoon he had been out with them a long time, and when James brought him in and put on his halter, he said:
‘There, you rogue, mind how you behave yourself, or we shall get into trouble.’
‘What have you been doing, Merrylegs?’ I asked.
‘Oh!’ said he, tossing his little head, ‘I have only been giving those young people a lesson, they did not know when they had had enough, nor when I had had enough, so I just pitched them off backwards, that was the only thing they could understand.’
‘What?’ said I, ‘you threw the children off? I thought you did know better than that! Did you throw Miss Jessie or Miss Flora?’
He looked very much offended, and said:
‘Of course not, I would not do such a thing for the best oats that ever came into the stable; why, I am as careful of our young ladies as the master could be, and as for the little ones, it is I who teach them to ride. When they seem frightened or a little unsteady on my back, I go as smooth and as quiet as old pussy when she is after a bird; and when they are all right, I go on again faster, you see, just to use them to it; so don’t you trouble yourself preaching to me; I am the best friend and the best riding master those children have. It is not them, it is the boys; boys,’ said he, shaking his mane, ‘are quite different; they must be broken in, as we were broken in when we were colts, and just be taught what’s what. The other children had ridden me about for nearly two hours, and then the boys thought it was their turn, and so it was, and I was quite agreeable. They rode me by turns, and I galloped them about up and down the fields and all about the orchard for a good hour. They had each cut a great hazel stick for a riding whip, and laid it on a little too hard; but I took it in good part, till at last I thought we had had enough, so I stopped two or three times by way of a hint. Boys, you see, think a horse or pony is like a steam engine or a thrashing machine, and can go on as long and as fast as they please; they never think that a pony can get tired, or have any feelings; so as the one who was whipping me could not understand, I just rose up on my hind legs and let him slip off behind – that was all; he mounted me again, and I did the same. Then the other boy got up, and as soon as he began to use his stick I laid him on the grass, and so on, till they were able to understand, that was all. They are not bad boys; they don’t wish to be cruel. I like them very well; but you see I had to give them a lesson. When they brought me to James and told him, I think he was very angry to see such big sticks. He said they were only fit for drovers or gipsies, and not for young gentlemen.’
‘If I had been you,’ said Ginger, ‘I would have given those boys a good kick, and that would have given them a lesson.’
‘No doubt you would,’ said Merrylegs, ‘but then I am not quite such a fool (begging your pardon) as to anger our master or make James ashamed of me; besides, those children are under my charge when they are riding; I tell you they are entrusted to me. Why, only the other day I heard our master say to Mrs Blomefield, “My dear madam, you need not be anxious about the children, my old Merrylegs will take as much care of them as you or I could: I assure you I would not sell that pony for any money, he is so perfectly good-tempered and trustworthy”; and do you think I am such an ungrateful brute as to forget all the kind treatment I have had here for five years, and all the trust they place in me, and turn vicious because a couple of ignorant boys used me badly? No! no! you never had a good place where they were kind to you; and so you don’t know, and I’m sorry for you, but I can tell you good places make good horses. I wouldn’t vex our people for anything; I love them, I do,’ said Merrylegs, and he gave a low ‘ho, ho, ho’ through his nose, as he used to do in the morning when he heard James’s footstep at the door.
