“Mumps did not touch his hock, I hope, when he kicked there?” asked Beecher.
“Call him Klepper,—never forget that,” remonstrated Grog; “he's remarkably like Mumps, that's all; but Mumps is in Staffordshire,—one of the Pottery fellows has him.”
“So he is,” laughed Beecher, pleasantly. “I know the man that owns him.”
“No, you don't,” broke in Davis; “you've only heard his name,—it is Coulson or Cotton, or something like that. One thing, however, is certain: he values him at twelve hundred pounds, and we 'd sell our horse for eight.”
“So we would, Grog, and be on the right side of the hedge too.”
“He'd be dog cheap for it,” said Davis; “he's one of those lazy beggars that never wear out. I 'd lay an even thousand on it that he runs this day two years as he does to-day, and even when he has n't speed for a flat race he 'll be a rare steeple-chase horse.”
Beecher's eyes glistened, and he rubbed his hands with delight as he heard him.
“I do like an ugly horse,” resumed Davis; “a heavy-shouldered beast, with lob-ears, lazy eyes, and capped hocks, and if they know how to come out a stable with a 'knuckle over' of the pastern, or a little bit lame, they 're worth their weight in gold.”
What a merry laugh was Beecher's as he listened!
“Blow me!” cried Grog, in a sort of enthusiasm, “if some horses don't seem born cheats,—regular legs! They drag their feet along, all weary and tired; if you push them a bit, they shut up, or they answer the whip with a kind of shrug, as if to say, 'It ain't any use punishing me at all,' the while they go plodding in, at the tail of the others, till within five, or maybe four lengths of the winning-post, and then you see them stretching—it ain't a stride, it's a stretch—you can't say how it's done, but they draw on—on—on, till you see half a head in front, and there they stay—just doing it—no more.”