stables for horses, and there will be no
difficulty. When you come to Esbjerg, take train to Horsens, where I
will meet you. A telegram must be sent me to Vandstrup Praestegaard, to
say when you will arrive at Horsens. Bring two hunting saddles and
bridles, and some of the snaffle bits that I like.

"Show this letter to the steward, and he will let you have what money
he thinks is necessary for your journey.

"Yours truly,

"John Hardy."

In little more than a week, Buffalo and Robert Garth were in Niels
Jacobsen's stables.

Buffalo was a good English-bred horse, a good jumper, with a chest
like a wall, and hind-quarters up to weight. Niels Jacobsen and his
neighbours had collected and criticized.

"Gild bevars! sikken en Hest!" ["God preserve us, what a horse!"] said
Niels, sucking away at his pipe, with a chorus echoing the same words
from his neighbours. There was no doubt of their approval, and Buffalo
had a succession of visitors and admirers for days.

Hardy had communicated to Pastor Lindal that he intended to have one
of his horses and a groom from England, and had great difficulty in
preventing the Pastor turning out his own small stable to make room
for Buffalo; but this Hardy would not allow. Robert Garth lodged at
Jacobsen's, and Hardy, with that thoughtfulness he always had for
those about him, arranged for his man's meals and sleeping quarters as
nearly as possible to an English groom's notions.

"Well, Bob," said Hardy, "you will shake down after a bit; but what I
want you to do is, to help me to pick out a pair of light carriage
horses from here. I have seen a lot, and you will have plenty to
choose from. They will suit my mother, and I wish to take them over as
a present to her."

"I have seen some of them Danish horses," said Robert Garth, "and not
half bad horses either; but it is the infernal lingo. They keep
smoking them big wood pipes, and when they don't smoke they chews, and
then they spits."

"Where did you see any Danish horses?" asked Hardy.

"At Sir Charles'; he had a pair, hardly up to fifteen hands, but very
pretty steppers, with a thinish mane, a trifle small below the knee,"
said Garth.

"That's the very thing," said Hardy.

As soon as it was known that the priest's Englishman wanted to buy two
Jutland horses, plenty offered; and Karl and Axel were intensely
interested in the trial of the horses, which went on in a rough piece
of land close to the parsonage.

When the