Black Beauty

would wear it as a
disguise; they would fashion my tail into wigs and beards and rob a bank. Just
fancy, somewhere in London my tail might be doing a robbery.’
    Sir Oliver was a fiery old
fellow; smoke used to sometimes exude from his bottom. Of course there were
some nervous horses who, having been frightened, would let go a lot of dung.
    ‘I have never let go a lot
of dung,’ said Sir Oliver. ‘I remember one dark night, just by farmer Sparrow’s
house where the pond is close to the road, a hearse bearing a coffin overturned
into the water. Both horses were drowned, the corpse floated away and was never
seen again. Of course, after this accident, a stout white rail was put up that
might be easily seen. However, a second hearse crashed through the rails, the
horses were drowned, and the stiff floated away like the first one.’ When our
master’s carriage was overturned he said that if the lamp on the left side had
not gone out, John would have seen the enormous hole the road makers left: his
carriage disappeared down it and, to this day, he has never been seen again.

11

PLAIN SPEAKING
     
    A pony was being whipped by a man
    Master said, ‘I’ll stop him if I can
    Sawyer, you shit, that pony’s made of flesh and blood’
    ‘He’s no good, sir, he be a dud’
    Sawyer the shit took up the reins
    And my master blew out his brains
    And they buried him in the garden
    Where the praties grow.
     
    The mistress was good and
kind and had a large bank overdraft. She was kind to everybody, not only men
and women but also horses and donkeys, dogs and cats, cattle and birds,
kangaroos, buffalo and wart hogs. If any of the children in the village were
known to treat any creature cruelly, she would beat them with an iron bar and
hang them upside down outside for the whole day. And if somebody didn’t find
favour with her, she would tell her husband, and he would blow their brains out
and bury them in the garden where the praties grow. Sometimes, our master
weighed very heavy. Sometimes he weighed fifteen stone, and when riding me gave
me curvature of the spine.
    One day, he saw Sawyer
ill-treating a pony. ‘Sawyer, you shit!’ he cried in a stern voice. ‘Is that
pony not made of flesh and blood?’
    ‘Flesh and blood and
temper,’ said the shit.
    ‘And do you think, you
shit,’ asked master firmly, ‘that! treatment like this will make him fond of
your will?’
    ‘I haven’t made out a will
yet,’ said the shit.
    Mr Sawyer, the shit, did
not react, so my master took out a blunderbuss, blew his brains out and buried
him in the garden where there was becoming less and less room.' The master was
much grieved by the loss of the shit. He i broke down and said, ‘Oh, deary me.’
    One day, when he had
stopped saying ‘oh, deary me,’ we met Captain Langley, a friend of our
master’s. He was driving a splendid pair of greys in a kind of brake. What kind
I could not say. The master backed me a little, so as to get a good view of
them.
    ‘They are uncommonly like
my wife, a very handsome pair,’ he said. ‘I see you have got hold of a bearing
rein. ‘Yes,’ said the captain. ‘I like to see my horses hold their heads up.’
    ‘You shit,’ said the
master, ‘I think every horse should have a free head. They should be sent by
parcel post to the horse in question.’
    ‘I’ll think about it,’ said
the captain, but as he drove away, my master took careful aim and blew the
captain’s brains out, and we had another grave to leap over.

12

A STORMY DAY
     
    Oh, terrible night of storm and wind
    As though the storm fiend grinned
    Master had to go away
    So I was in the dogcart that day
    When we reached the tollgate it wasn’t surprising
    The tollman said the river was rising
    We drove thru the water to the other side
    Mostly I was under water, and nearly died
    On the way back we went through a wood
    ‘I don’t think,’ said John, ‘we should’
    Then a tearing, an oak tree crashed on the road
    It missed us but hit a toad
    We returned by the flooded bridge over the river
    The thought made me shiver
    The tollman said, ‘Stop, the bridge is washed away’
    ‘Thank god,’ said John, Hip, Hip, Hooray.
     
    One day in autumn, he
called it Wednesday because that’s what it was, the master had a long journey
on business. I was put into the dogcart, and John went with his faster. We went
merrily along until we came to the tollbar, and the low wooden bridge. The
river banks were rather high, and the