Before I could comment on my friend’s narrative we were spattered with mud by passing riders, and stopped to repair the damage to our coats.
“Jolly for my new coat!” I said. “Do you notice, by the way, that they are cutting men’s tails longer this spring? More becoming to a fellow, I think.”
He raised those quizzical eyebrows of his and murmured:
“And horses’ tails shorter. Did you see those that passed just now?”
“No.”
“There were none!”
“Nonsense!” I said. “My dear fellow, you really are obsessed about beasts! They were just ordinary.”
“Quite—a few scrubby hairs, and a wriggle.”
“Now, please,” I said, “don’t begin to talk of the cruelty of docking horses’ tails, and tell me a story of an old horse in a pond.”
“No,” he answered, “for I should have to invent that. What I was going to say was this: Which do you think the greater fools in the matter of fashion—men or women?”