ends his nostrils--on a sudden toss you the reins and leave you to
guard him while he dispatches an errand. If it were a motor car there would
be a brake to hold it. If it were a boat, you might throw out an anchor. A
butcher's cart would have a metal drag. But here you sit defenseless--tied
to the whim of a horse--greased for a runaway. The beast Dobbin turns his
head and holds you with his hard eye. There is a convulsive movement along
his back, a preface, it may be, to a sudden seizure. A real friend would
have loosed the straps that run along the horse's flanks. Then, if any
deviltry take him, he might go off alone and have it out.

I have in mind a livery stable in Kalamazoo. Myself and another man of
equal equestrianism were sent once to bring out a thing called a surrey and
a pair of horses. Do you happen to be acquainted with Blat's Horse Food? If
your way lies among the smaller towns, you must know its merits. They are
proclaimed along the fences and up the telegraph poles. Drinking-troughs
speak its virtues. Horses thrive on Blat's Food. They neigh for it. A
flashing lithograph is set by way of testament wherever traffic turns or
lingers. Do you not recall the picture? A great red horse rears himself
on his hind legs. His forward hoofs are extended. He is about to trample
someone under foot. His nostrils are wide. He is unduly excited. It cannot
be food, it must be drink that stirs him. He is a fearful spectacle.

There was such a picture on the wall of the stable.

"Have you any horses," I asked nervously, jerking my thumb toward the wall,
"any horses that have been fed on just ordinary food? Some that are a
little tired?"

For I remembered how Mr. Winkle once engaged horses to take the
Pickwickians out to Manor Farm and what mishaps befell them on the way.

"'He don't shy, does he?' inquired Mr. Pickwick.

"'Shy, sir?--He wouldn't shy if he was to meet a vagginload of monkeys with
their tails burnt off.'"

But how Mr. Pickwick dropped his whip, how Mr. Winkle got off his tall
horse to pick it up, how he tried in vain to remount while his horse went
round and round, how they were all spilt out upon the bridge and how
finally they walked to Manor Farm--these things are known to everybody with
an inch of reading.

"'How far is it to Dingley Dell?' they asked.

"'Better er seven mile.'

"'Is it a good road?'

"'No, t'ant.'...

"The depressed Pickwickians turned moodily away, with the tall quadruped,