bborn? Not I. I let you go round and
round; I turned you and twisted you, the oftener the better for me, till
at last I got it into your pretty head that turning and twisting was
addling your brains, and you had better let me be master.

"You've minded me from that day, haven't you? Horse, or man, or dog
aren't much good till they learn to obey, and I've thrown you down and
I'll do it again if you bite me, so take care."

Scamp tossed her pretty head, and took little pieces of Mr. Wood's shirt
sleeve in her mouth, keeping her cunning brown eye on him as if to see
how far she could go. But she did not bite him. I think she loved him,
for when he left her she whinnied shrilly, and he had to go back and
stroke and caress her.

After that I often used to watch her as she went about the farm. She
always seemed to be tugging and striving at her load, and trying to step
out fast and do a great deal of work. Mr. Wood was usually driving
her. The men didn't like her, and couldn't manage her. She had not been
properly broken in.

After Mr. Wood finished his work he went and stood in the doorway. There
were six horses altogether: Dutchman, Cleve, Pacer, Scamp, a bay mare
called Ruby, and a young horse belonging to Mr. Harry, whose name was
Fleetfoot.

"What do you think of them all?" said Mr. Wood, looking down at me.
"A pretty fine-looking lot of horses, aren't they? Not a thoroughbred
there, but worth as much to me as if each had pedigree as long as this
plank walk. There's a lot of humbug about this pedigree business in
horses. Mine have their manes and tails anyway, and the proper use of
their eyes, which is more liberty than some thoroughbreds get.

"I'd like to see the man that would persuade me to put blinders or
check-reins or any other instrument of torture on my horses. Don't the
simpletons know that blinders are the cause of well, I wouldn't like to
say how many of our accidents, Joe, for fear you'd think me extravagant.
and the check-rein drags up a horse's head out of its fine natural
curve and presses sinews, bones, and joints together, till the horse is
well-nigh mad. Ah, Joe, this is a cruel world for man or beast. You're
a standing token of that, with your missing ears and tail. And now
I've got to go and be cruel, and shoot that dog. He must be disposed of
before anyone else is astir. How I hate to take life."

He sauntered down the walk to the tool shed, went in and soon came out
leading a large, brown d