THE WORN-OUT TEAM.
TWO horses, a bay and a gray, were bred on the same farm. Being nearly of an age and about equal in size, they were mated in harness, and, working well together, were kept as a pair. They went to the plough, the harrow, and the hay-wagon season after season. In this close companionship there grew up something of an attachment between them, although they differed in disposition. The gray was patient and uncomplaining, while the bay, though quite as good a worker, was not of so good a temper.
The seasons came and went. In the spring they toiled together turning up the heavy sod, in the autumn hauling in great loads of hay and grain, until at length, as years passed by, their bulky forms began to shrink and ribs and thigh-bones to appear. More than this, the gray lifted one hind leg higher than formerly, giving a hint of the string-halt, and the bay panted so violently after a short journey as to suggest a thought of the heaves. But they had done their share of work, and the farmer was not the man to sell them off now to some hard fate: they were allowed to stand in the stable or given lighter tasks, while a pair of young horses, that had come on in the mean while, were put to the heavy work about the farm.
One summer day, while the old horses were resting in their stalls, the hay-wagon came in with a load from the field. As it drew near the barn the farmer’s son shouted to encourage his young team up the rise that led on to the barn-floor, and the old pair heard them, as they entered, pounding overhead.
“That is what we used to do,” said the bay, “until they put the colts in our place.”
“We never thought then of getting old and past work,” said the gray.