Beautiful Joe, Marshall Saunders [historical books to read .TXT] 📗

keep them no matter how they worry

other people, and even when they're snatching the bread out of their

neighbors' mouths. But I say that is not the fault of the four-legged

dog. A human dog is the worst of all. There's a band of sheep-killing

dogs here in Riverdale, that their owners can't, or won't, keep out of

mischief. Meek-looking fellows some of them are. The owners go to bed at

night, and the dogs pretend to go, too; but when the house is quiet and

the family asleep, off goes Rover or Fido to worry poor, defenseless

creatures that can't defend themselves. Their taste for sheep's blood is

like the taste for liquor in men, and the dogs will travel as far to get

their fun, as the men will travel for theirs. They've got it in them,

and you can't get it out.

 

"Mr. Windham cured his dog," said Mrs. Wood.

 

Mr. Wood burst into a hearty laugh. "So he did, so he did. I must tell

Laura about that. Windham is a neighbor of ours, and last summer I kept

telling him that his collie was worrying my Shropshires. He wouldn't

believe me, but I knew I was right, and one night when Harry was home,

he lay in wait for the dog and lassoed him. I tied him up and sent for

Windham. You should have seen his face, and the dog's face. He said two

words, 'You scoundrel!' and the dog cowered at his feet as if he had

been shot. He was a fine dog, but he'd got corrupted by evil companions.

Then Windham asked me where my sheep were. I told him in the pasture. He

asked me if I still had my old ram Bolton. I said yes, and then he

wanted eight or ten feet of rope. I gave it to him, and wondered what on

earth he was going to do with it. He tied one end of it to the dog's

collar, and holding the other in his hand, set out for the pasture. He

asked us to go with him, and when he got there, he told Harry he'd like

to see him catch Bolton. There wasn't any need to catch him, he'd come

to us like a dog. Harry whistled, and when Bolton came up, Windham

fastened the rope's end to his horns, and let him go. The ram was

frightened and ran, dragging the dog with him. We let them out of the

pasture into an open field, and for a few minutes there was such a

racing and chasing over that field as I never saw before. Harry leaned

up against the bars and laughed till the tears rolled down his cheeks,

Then Bolton got mad, and began to make battle with the dog, pitching

into him with his horns. We soon stopped that, for the spirit had all

gone out of Dash. Windham unfastened the rope, and told him to get home,

and if ever I saw a dog run, that one did. Mrs. Windham set great store

by him, and her husband didn't want to kill him. But he said Dash had

got to give up his sheep-killing, if he wanted to live. That cured him.

He's never worried a sheep from that day to this, and if you offer him a

bit of sheep's wool now, he tucks his tail between his legs, and runs

for home. Now, I must stop my talk, for we're in sight of the farm.

Yonder's our boundary line, and there's the house. You'll see a

difference in the trees since you were here before."

 

We had come to a turn in the road where the ground sloped gently upward.

We turned in at the gate, and drove between rows of trees up to a long,

low, red house, with a veranda all round it. There was a wide lawn in

front, and away on our right were the farm buildings. They too, were

painted red, and there were some trees by them that Mr. Wood called his

windbreak, because they kept the snow from drifting in the winter time.

 

I thought it was a beautiful place. Miss Laura had been here before, but

not for some years, so she, too, was looking about quite eagerly.

 

"Welcome to Dingley Farm, Joe," said Mrs. Wood, with her jolly laugh, as

she watched me jump from the carriage seat to the ground. "Come in, and

I'll introduce you to pussy."

 

"Aunt Hattie, why is the farm called Dingley Farm?" said Miss Laura, as

we went into the house. "It ought to be Wood Farm."

 

"Dingley is made out of 'dingle,' Laura. You know that pretty hollow

back of the pasture? It is what they call a 'dingle.' So this farm was

called Dingle Farm till the people around about got saying 'Dingley'

instead. I suppose they found it easier. Why, here is Lolo coming to see

Joe."

 

Walking along the wide hall that ran through the house was a large

tortoise-shell cat. She had a prettily marked face, and she was waving

her large tail like a flag, and mewing kindly to greet her mistress. But

when she saw me what a face she made. She flew on the hall table, and

putting up her back till it almost lifted her feet from the ground,

began to spit at me and bristle with rage.

 

"Poor Lolo," said Mrs. Wood, going up to her. "Joe is a good dog, and

not like Bruno. He won't hurt you."

 

I wagged myself about a little, and looked kindly at her, but she did

nothing but say bad words to me. It was weeks and weeks before I made

friends with that cat. She was a young thing, and had known only one

dog, and he was a bad one, so she supposed all dogs were like him.

 

There was a number of rooms opening off the hall, and one of them was

the dining room where they had tea. I lay on a rug outside the door and

watched them. There was a small table spread with a white cloth, and it

had pretty dishes and glassware on it, and a good many different kinds

of things to eat. A little French girl, called Adele, kept coming and

going from the kitchen to give them hot cakes, and fried eggs, and hot

coffee. As soon as they finished their tea, Mrs. Wood gave me one of the

best meals that I ever had in my life.

 

 

 

 

 

       *       *       *       *       *

CHAPTER XVII (MR. WOOD AND HIS HORSES)

The morning after we arrived in Riverdale I was up very early and

walking around the house. I slept in the woodshed, and could run

outdoors whenever I liked.

 

The woodshed was at the back of the house, and near it was the tool

shed. Then there was a carriage house, and a plank walk leading to the

barnyard.

 

I ran up this walk, and looked into the first building I came to. It was

the horse stable. A door stood open, and the morning sun was glancing

There were several horses there, some with their heads toward me,

and some with their tails. I saw that instead of being tied up, there

were gates outside their stalls, and they could stand in any way they

liked.

 

There was a man moving about at the other end of the stable, and long

before he saw me, I knew that it was Mr. Wood. What a nice, clean stable

he had! There was always a foul smell coming out of Jenkins's stable,

but here the air seemed as pure inside as outside. There was a number of

little gratings in the wall to let in the fresh air, and they were so

placed that drafts would not blow on the horses. Mr. Wood was going from

one horse to another, giving them hay, and talking to them in a cheerful

voice. At last he spied me, and cried out, "The top of the morning to

you, Joe! You are up early. Don't come too near the horses, good dog,"

as I walked in beside him; "they might think you are another Bruno, and

give you a sly bite or kick. I should have shot him long ago. 'Tis hard

to make a good dog suffer for a bad one, but that's the way of the

world. Well, old fellow, what do you think of my horse stable? Pretty

fair, isn't it?" And Mr. Wood went on talking to me as he fed and

groomed his horses, till I soon found out that his chief pride was in

them.

 

I like to have human beings talk to me. Mr. Morris often reads his

sermons to me, and Miss Laura tells me secrets that I don't think she

would tell to any one else.

 

I watched Mr. Wood carefully, while he groomed a huge, gray cart-horse,

that he called Dutchman. He took a brush in his right hand, and a

curry-comb in his left, and he curried and brushed every part of the

horse's skin, and afterward wiped him with a cloth. "A good grooming is

equal to two quarts of oats, Joe," he said to me.

 

Then he stooped down and examined the horse's hoofs. "Your shoes are too

heavy, Dutchman," he said; "but that pig-headed blacksmith thinks he

knows more about horses than I do. 'Don't cut the sole nor the frog,' I

say to him. 'Don't pare the hoof so much, and don't rasp it; and fit

your shoe to the foot, and not the foot to the shoe,' and he looks as if

he wanted to say, 'Mind your own business.' We'll not go to him again.

''Tis hard to teach an old dog new tricks.' I got you to work for me,

not to wear out your strength in lifting about his weighty shoes."

 

Mr. Wood stopped talking for a few minutes, and whistled a tune. Then he

began again. "I've made a study of horses, Joe. Over forty years I've

studied them, and it's my opinion that the average horse knows more than

the average man that drives him. When I think of the stupid fools that

are goading patient horses about, beating them and misunderstanding

them, and thinking they are only clods of earth with a little life in

them, I'd like to take their horses out of the shafts and harness them

in, and I'd trot them off at a pace, and slash them, and jerk them, till

I guess they'd come out with a little less patience than the animal

does.

 

"Look at this Dutchman--see the size of him. You'd think he hadn't any

more nerves than a bit of granite. Yet he's got a skin as sensitive as a

girl's. See how he quivers if I run the curry-comb too harshly over him.

The idiot I got him from didn't know what was the matter with him. He'd

bought him for a reliable horse, and there he was, kicking and stamping

whenever the boy went near him. 'Your boy's got too heavy a hand, Deacon

Jones,' said I, when he described the horse's actions to me. 'You may

depend upon it, a four-legged creature, unlike a two-legged one, has a

reason for everything he does.' 'But he's only a draught horse,' said

Deacon Jones. 'Draught horse or no draught horse,' said I, 'you're

describing a horse with a tender skin to me, and I don't care if he's as

big as an elephant.' Well, the old man grumbled and said he didn't want

any thoroughbred airs in his stable, so I bought you, didn't I,

Dutchman?" and Mr. Wood stroked him kindly and went to the next stall.

 

In each stall was a small tank of water with a sliding cover, and I

found out afterward that these covers were put on when a horse came in

too heated to have a drink. At any other time, he could drink all he

liked. Mr. Wood believed in having plenty of pure water for all his

animals and