Poor Blossom: The Story of a Horse

by Edith Carrington

The ferret-faced man, before removing me, put some ointment upon my sores, and painted my legs with something which hid my accident from the eyes of casual observers; then he led me through the town into the country, where we joined company with another ferret-faced man who had several horses of various sizes and ages under his charge. I was tied to the rest with a halter, and then we jogged quietly along the road, the two men smoking and chatting as we went along.

My companions were strange to me—strange in the strictest sense of the word, for they had all been brought up in London, a place I had heard very little of; but I was certainly not impressed with any favourable notion of it when I saw their flippant pert ways, and became acquainted with the style of their conversation. Naturally I, as soon as I joined company, wished them good day, and made some remark upon the fineness of the weather and the excellence of the second hay crop. To this they one and all responded with a sarcastic roll of the eye, and one old horse most impertinently called me a ‘yokel’—an insult I resented by becoming perfectly quiet and withdrawing as soon as possible from a company where I could see I was not particularly wanted.

I gathered from what they said that they had been down to some place belonging to the ferret-faced man ‘to grass,’ that is, to recruit their health after a season of very heavy work in town. They all seemed to like an idle life, but some of them really cared very little for the country, and generally expressed themselves glad to return to town.

‘Another month here would have killed me,’ said a young horse with a Roman nose; ‘it is so dreadfully slow, and I cannot live without “fun.” Of course the fresh air and the green fields and the purer water we get does us good bodily—but we must feed the mind, you know.’

The others agreed to this, and I kept on for a long time thinking and surmising what sort of food for the mind could be obtained in the great city. I have learnt since, and I must say that much better food for the mind—food more wholesome and nourishing—can be obtained in the country than in the town; but we must not be astonished at poor ignorant horses expressing such an opinion, when we know that thousands of intelligent men declare the same thing.

We did not walk the whole way to town—London was a long way off; but on our arrival at a place much larger than Upton, we were taken to a tremendous barn-like place roofed in with glass, and filled with large boxes upon wheels, some of them with chimneys to them, which puffed and snorted in such a way that I could not help jumping about in a fright, much to the amusement of my companions. The ferret-faced man, probably with a view to restore my calmness, beat me about the head with a stick, and then hustled me into one of the boxes with another horse, and closed the door.

I found myself shut in with one of the best of my late companions—a horse who had in snubbing me rather followed the leadership of others than obeyed the dictation of his own feelings. He told me not to be alarmed, that there was nothing to fear, and that we were going to travel about a hundred miles by railway. I asked him what a railway was, and he told me it was something which man had made to imitate the horse, to do its work in transmitting men and goods.

‘But it is a very poor imitation,’ he said; ‘they cannot trust it anywhere off the particular road and rails laid down for it; and there is no grace, no action in it, and whatever it does it makes a frightful noise about. I know that any horse would blush to make half the fuss. When man first made it, he said that he could do without the horse; but he made a great mistake. Horses,’ added my informant with some pride, ‘have since the establishment of railways become worth double the money.’

I asked a deal more about this railway, and my companion gave me a very good general idea of this base but fortunately unsuccessful attempt to supersede the horse, with which I do not intend to trouble my readers; and just as he finished, the train started.

Oh! the agony of that journey!—the shaking, the jolting, the screaming, the roaring, and the noise and rattle of other trains as they passed us—it was dreadful, especially to me who had never undergone the ordeal before. My companion suffered less—he had travelled upon, many occasions, and was more composed. In about four hours we arrived in London, and I being released, took my first peep at the big city.