Black Beauty

carter, called Jakes
    To serve them it took me all it takes
    Going downhill he never put on the brakes
    ‘With that load, your horse you’ll kill’
    Said a gentlewoman called Jill
    ‘Keep quiet you silly girl’
    She, with a karate hold, gave him a huge hurl
    He landed over a mile away
    It made my day
    He ran away to Spain
    And we never saw him again.
     
    I was sold to a corn dealer
for three and six a pound whom Jeremiah Barker knew and he thought I should
have good food and fair work.
    In the first he was quite
right, and if my master had always been on the premises, I do not think I
should have been over-loaded; but there was a foreman who was always hurrying
and driving everyone, even Queen Victoria, and frequendy, when I had quite a
full load, he would order something else to be taken on. My carter said it was
more than I ought to take, but the other always overruled him:
    ‘ ’Twas no use going twice
when once would do, and he chose to get business forward.’
    Jakes, like the other
carters, always had the bearing rein up, which prevented me from drawing
easily, and by the time I had been there three or four months, I found the work
telling very much; I was shagged out.
    One day, I was loaded more
than usual, and too often, and part of the road was a steep uphill: I used all
my strength and Vitamin B tablets, and some Horlicks, but I could not get on.
This did not please my driver, and he laid his whip on badly.
    ‘Get on, you lazy fellow,’
he said, ‘or I’ll tweak your swannicles.’ Oh, no! I’d do anything for him not
to tweak my swannicles.
    Again I took some Horlicks
tablets, started the heavy load, and struggled on a few yards backwards; again
the whip came down, and again, to soothe it, I struggled backwards. The pain of
that great cart whip was sharp. I’d sue the makers of Horlicks. A third time he
was flogging me cruelly, when a lady stepped up to him:
    ‘Oh! pray do not whip your
good horse any more. I am sure he is doing all he can; the road is very steep
and I am sure he is doing his best.’
    ‘If doing his best won’t
get this load up, he must do something more than his best; that’s all I know,
ma’am,’ said Jakes, which was all he knew.
    ‘But is it not a very heavy
load?’ she asked.
    ‘Yes,’ he said, louder,
‘but that’s not my fault, I must get on with it as well as I can.’
    He was raising the whip
again, when the lady threw him over her shoulder judo style; she was a sixth
Dan. ‘He cannot use all his power with his head held back, as it is with that
bearing rein. If you take it off, I am sure he would do better — do try
it,’ she said persuasively, giving him a karate chop.
    ‘Yes, ma’am,’ said the
terrified carter. The rein was taken off; what a comfort it was!
    ‘Poor fellow! that is what
you wanted,’ said she.
    Jakes took the rein — ‘Come
on, Blackie.’ I put down my head, and threw my whole weight against the collar;
I spared no strength; the load moved on, and I pulled it steadily up the hill —
and then stopped to take a spoonful of Sanatogen.
    The lady had walked along
the footpath, and now came across the road, stopping only to throw the carter
on his back.
    ‘You see, he was quite
willing when you gave him the chance; I am sure he is a fine-tempered creature,
and I dare say he has known better days. You won’t put that rein on again, will
you?’
    ‘Well, ma’am, I can’t deny
that having his head and Horlicks has helped him up the hill.’
    ‘Is it not better?’ she
said. ‘I thank you for trying my plan with your good horse. Good-day,’ and with
another soft pat on my neck, she stepped lightly across the path, and I ran
over her.
    I may as well mention here
what I suffered at this time from another cause. I had heard horses speak of
it; mine was a badly lighted stable; there was only one very small window at
the end, and the stalls were almost dark. It very much weakened my sight, and
when I was suddenly brought out of the darkness into the glare of sunlight, it
was very painful to my eyes (I had to have glasses), and I drove into a
shop-front window. However, I escaped without any permanent injury to my sight,
and was sold to a large cab owner.

47

HARD TIMES
     
    Now my new master was called Skinner
    He wouldn’t give you the price of a dinner
    My driver was very, very cruel
    All I had to eat was watery gruel
    I became so very thin
    You could see in
    Coming down Ludgate Hill
    I fell and became very ill
    I wanted to