A Busy Year at the Old Squire's

by C. A. Stephens

"Goodness! What will the old Squire say to this?" were Addison's first words.

After a search, we found a lantern under a heap of bags and harness. It was cracked, but Asa succeeded in lighting it; and about the first object I saw with any distinctness was old Tommy, doubled up behind a tree.

"Are you hurt?" Addison called to him.

"Wal, I vum, I dunno!" the old man grunted. "Wa'n't that a rib-h'ister!"

Concluding that there was not much the matter with him, we hastened down to the brook. There hung one horse—William-le-Bon—head downward, pawing on the stones in the brook with his fore hoofs. He had caught his left hind leg in the crotch of a yellow birch-tree that grew at the foot of the ledges. In the brook lay Sally, with a broken foreleg. Beyond her was Duncan, dead; he had broken his neck. Lill was cast between two big stones; and she, too, had broken her leg. Moaning dolefully, Prince floundered near by. Another horse had got to his feet; he was dragging one leg, which seemed to be out of joint or broken.

Meanwhile the storm swirled and eddied. We did not know what to do. Asa declared that it was useless to try to save Prince, and with a blow of the axe he put him out of his misery. Then, while I held the lantern, he and Addison cut the birch-tree in which William-le-Bon hung. The poor animal struggled so violently at times that they had no easy task of it; but at last the tree fell over, and we got the horse's leg free. It was broken, however, and he could not get up.

As to the others, it was hard to say, there in the night and storm, what we ought to do for them. In the woods a horse with a broken leg is little better than dead, and in mercy is usually put out of its misery. We knew that the four horses lying there were very seriously injured, and Asa thought that we ought to put an end to their sufferings. But Addison and I could not bring ourselves to kill them, and we went to ask Tommy's advice.

The old man was pottering about the scoot, trying to recover his traps and gun. He hobbled down to the brink of the chasm and peered over at the disabled animals; but "I vum, I dunno," was all that we could get from him in the way of advice.

At last we brought the horse blankets from the scoot and put them over the suffering creatures to protect them from the storm. In their efforts to get up, however, the animals thrashed about constantly, and the blankets did not shelter them much. We had no idea where the horses were that had run away.

At last, about midnight, we set off afoot up the trail to the nearest lumber camp. Asa led the way with the lantern, and old Tommy followed behind us with his precious traps. The camp was nearly six miles away; it proved a hard, dismal tramp, for now the snow was seven or eight inches deep. We reached the camp between two and three o'clock in the morning, and roused Andrews, the foreman, and his crew of loggers. Never was warm shelter more welcome to us.