‘Were you ever beaten?’ I asked.
‘Once I had a very cruel master,’ said my mother with a sigh; ‘but I do not care to talk about it. If ever it should be your lot to find such a man you will know enough about it then.’
‘But why did you endure it?’ I asked; ‘are you not stronger than man? Why did you not kick?’
‘My child,’ said my mother impressively, ‘do not talk so idly: we are created the lawful servants of man, and it is our duty to submit. If he is kind we repay him tenfold; if he is cruel we must do our duty still, and the sin of cruelty be upon his head. Besides we are in his power—he has so many things at his command, and if we disobey him he can put us to great pain. You will learn that when you come to be broken.’
‘What is that?’ I inquired.
‘Your training so that you may be useful to man,’ returned my mother; ‘you will have to do your work one day with the rest of us.’
There was a pause after this, and my mother cropped the sweet grass while I meditated. My curiosity was aroused with regard to this creature who ruled over us, and I soon renewed the subject.
‘Tell me more about our master, man,’ I said; ‘I am very anxious to learn something about him.’
‘He is a strange creature,’ said my mother—‘as much a puzzle to himself as to the rest of the created world. He is very clever in some things and very stupid in others; for instance, he knows nothing of our language, although we understand his perfectly. If Giles—that is Mr. Bayne’s foreman—bids me go here or there, I understand him without rein or whip; and yet when he was ploughing in the ten-acre field, and I pulling up told him as plain as I could that we were near a piece of hollow ground, he would not understand me, but made me go on—and then the ground gave way and we were almost buried alive.’
‘How did you know it was hollow?’ said I.