ome out of the men's mouths
when Diamond was near. The one would nudge the other to remind him that
the boy was within hearing, and the words choked themselves before they
got any farther. When they talked to him nicely he had always a good
answer, sometimes a smart one, ready, and that helped much to make them
change their minds about him.

One day Jack gave him a curry-comb and a brush to try his hand upon
old Diamond's coat. He used them so deftly, so gently, and yet so
thoroughly, as far as he could reach, that the man could not help
admiring him.

"You must make haste and, grow" he said. "It won't do to have a horse's
belly clean and his back dirty, you know."

"Give me a leg," said Diamond, and in a moment he was on the old horse's
back with the comb and brush. He sat on his withers, and reaching
forward as he ate his hay, he curried and he brushed, first at one side
of his neck, and then at the other. When that was done he asked for a
dressing-comb, and combed his mane thoroughly. Then he pushed himself on
to his back, and did his shoulders as far down as he could reach. Then
he sat on his croup, and did his back and sides; then he turned around
like a monkey, and attacked his hind-quarters, and combed his tail. This
last was not so easy to manage, for he had to lift it up, and every now
and then old Diamond would whisk it out of his hands, and once he sent
the comb flying out of the stable door, to the great amusement of the
men. But Jack fetched it again, and Diamond began once more, and did not
leave off until he had done the whole business fairly well, if not in
a first-rate, experienced fashion. All the time the old horse went
on eating his hay, and, but with an occasional whisk of his tail when
Diamond tickled or scratched him, took no notice of the proceeding.
But that was all a pretence, for he knew very well who it was that
was perched on his back, and rubbing away at him with the comb and the
brush. So he was quite pleased and proud, and perhaps said to himself
something like this--

"I'm a stupid old horse, who can't brush his own coat; but there's my
young godson on my back, cleaning me like an angel."

I won't vouch for what the old horse was thinking, for it is very
difficult to find out what any old horse is thinking.

"Oh dear!" said Diamond when he had done, "I'm so tired!"

And he laid himself down at full length on old Diamond's back.

By this time all the men in the stable were gather