ed down her tail the harder.
Experience showed that the only way was to go slowly and craftily and
without heat or temper--a slackening of the reins--a distraction of Dolly's
attention--a leaning across the dashboard--a firm grasping of the tail out
near the end--a sudden raising thereof. Ah! It was done. We all settled
back against the cushions. Or perhaps a friendly fly would come to our
assistance and Dolly would have to use her tail in another direction.

The whip was seldom used. Generally it stood in its socket. It was
ornamental like a flagstaff. It forgot its sterner functions. But Dolly
must have known the whip in some former life, for even a gesture toward the
socket roused her. If it was rattled she mended her pace for a block. But
if on a rare occasion my grandfather took it in his hand, Dolly lay one ear
back in our direction, for she knew then he meant business. And what an
excitement would arise in the phaeton! We held on tight for fear that she
might take it into her mild old head to run away.

But Dolly had her moments. One sunny summer afternoon while she grazed
peacefully in the orchard, with her reins wound around the whip handle--the
appropriate place on these occasions--she was evidently stung by a bee. My
brother was at the time regaling himself in a near-by blackberry thicket.
He looked up at an unusual sound. Without warning, Dolly had leaped to
action and was tearing around the orchard dragging the phaeton behind
her. She wrecked the top on a low hanging branch, then hit another tree,
severing thereby all connection between herself and the phaeton, and at
last galloped down the lane to the farm house, with the broken shafts and
harness dangling behind her. Kipling's dun "with the mouth of a bell and
the heart of Hell and the head of the gallows-tree," could hardly have
shown more spirit. It was as though one brief minute of a glorious youth
had come back to her. It was a last spurting of an old flame before it sunk
to ash.

My grandfather gave his leisure to his grandchildren. He carved for us with
his knife, with an especial knack for willow whistles. He showed us the
colors that lay upon the world when we looked at it through one of the
glass pendants of the parlor chandelier. He sat by us when we played
duck-on-the-rock. He helped us with our kites and gave a superintendence to
our toys. It is true that he was superficial with tin-tags and did not know
the difference in value between a Stea