but still seemed determined to do
his best, and limped and stumbled a yard or two further on. I confess it
seemed impossible to believe the horse to be quite sound, and if it had
depended on me, the "Dodger" would instantly have been unharnessed
and put back in his stable. But the moment had come to unmask him. His
master stepped forward, and pulling first one cunning ear, on the alert
for every word, and then the other; cried, "It wont do, sir! step out
directly, and don't let us have any nonsense." The "Dodger" groaned
again, this time from his heart probably, shook himself, and, leaning
well forward in his big collar, stepped out without a murmur. The
lameness had disappeared by magic, nor was there even the slightest
return of it until he saw a new driver, and considered it safe to try
his oft-successful "dodge" once more.

Very different was "Star," poor, wilful, beauty, whose name and fate
will long be remembered among the green hills, where her short life was
passed. Born and bred on the station, she was the pride and joy of her
owner's heart. Slender without being weedy, compact without clumsiness,
her small head well set on her graceful neck, and her fine legs, with
their sinews like steel, she attracted the envy of all the neighbouring
squatters. "What will you take for that little grey filly when she is
broken?" was a constant question. "She's not for sale," her owner used
to answer. "I'll break her myself, and make her as gentle as a dog, and
she'll do for my wife when I get one." But this proved a castle in the
air, so far as Star was concerned. The wife was not so mythical. In due
time _she_ appeared in that sheltered valley, and, standing at the head
of a mound marked by a stake whereon a star was rudely carved, heard the
story of the poor creature's fate. From the first week of her life,
Star (so-called from a black, five-pointed mark on her forehead), showed
signs of possessing a strange wild nature. Unlike her sire or dam, she
evidently had a violent temper,--and not to put too fine a point on
it,--was as vicious a grey mare as ever flung up her heels in a New
Zealand valley.

When her second birthday was passed, Star's education commenced. The
process called "gentling," was a complete misnomer for the series of
buck jumps, of bites and kicks, with which the young lady received
the slightest attempt to touch her. She had a horrible habit also of
shrieking, really almost like a human being in a franti