squeaking and squealing in the most
outrageous manner imaginable.

I have no doubt that it was most terribly unpleasant to the rider,
painful, probably; but to a looker-on it was one of the most ludicrous
of sights, and in spite of heat, weariness, and a tendency to low
spirits, I laughed till the tears ran down my cheeks, while Tom grinned
with pain and held on with both hands to the refractory beast.

"Ah! would you?" cried Tom, as the brute lifted its heels higher than
usual, nearly sending him over its head. "There never was such a beast
as this here, Mas'r Harry. If I'd only got a thicker stick!"

One could not pity him much, for at starting he had rejected three or
four quiet-looking beasts as too slow, and chosen the animal he rode, or
rather tried to ride, for, if the reader will pardon the Irishism, a
great deal of Tom's riding was walking, and performed by leading his
beast by its bridle.

But really it was a deceptive beast, and to have seen it drooping its
head and walking calmly and peacefully by its hirer's side, no one would
have imagined that it possessed so much mischievous sagacity as it very
soon displayed when anyone attempted to mount it.

"I like 'em with some sperrit in 'em, Mas'r Harry," Tom had said. "If
it was a horse it would be different; but if one's to ride a donkey,
let's have one with something in it."

And verily Tom's donkey, as he called it, was not very long before it
showed that it had, indeed, something in it, a great deal more, in fact,
than Tom had bargained for. We did not pass many trees by the track,
but when we did come upon one Tom had certain information thereof, for
the mule rubbed his rider's leg vigorously against the trunk. The sight
of a muddy pool of water was the signal for him to squeak, elevate his
heels, and then go off at a sharp gallop, when, if his rider did not
quickly slip off behind, he would be carried into the pool and bathed,
for the mule would drink his fill and then indulge in a roll in the mud
and water. In short, I never before saw so many acts of cunning in an
animal, one and all directed at dislodging the rider.

At first I was in a state of tremor lest his vagaries should infect the
beasts ridden by myself and the guide; but no, they were evidently
elderly mules--bordering on a hundred they might have been, from their
grey and mangy aspect. They had sown their wild oats years before, and
all that they did was to trudge solemnly on, qu