her mane, and his rosy feet paddled against her. He was going to be her
master after a while, and take care of her in her old age, when the time
of her rest was come; he knew her name as well as he knew his own, and
went wild with delight when he saw her taking clover from the tiny hand
of his sister or drinking water from the bucket at the well.

"She grows handsomer every year," Hobert often said; "and with a little
training I would not be afraid to match her against the speediest racer
they can bring." And this remark was always intended as in some sort a
compliment to Jenny, and was always so received by her.

On this special day he had stopped oftener in the furrow than common;
and as often as he stopped Fleety twisted round her neck, bent her soft
eyes upon him, and twitched her little ears as though she would say, "Is
not all right, my master?" And then he would walk round to her head, and
pass his hand along her throat and through her foretop, calling her by
her pet name, and pulling for her handfuls of fresh grass, and while she
ate it resting himself against her, and feeling in her nearness almost a
sense of human protection. His feet seemed to drag under him, and there
was a dull aching in all his limbs; the world appeared to be receding
from him, and at times he could hardly tell whether he stood upon solid
ground. Then he accused himself of being lazy and good for nothing, and
with fictitious energy took up the reins and started the plough.

He looked at the sun again and again. He was not used to leaving off
work while the sun shone, and the clear waters of the Wabash held as yet
no faintest evening flush. There were yet two good hours of working time
before him, when the quick shooting of a pain, like the running of a
knife through his heart, caused him to stagger in the furrow. Fleety
stopped of her own accord, and looked pityingly back. He sat down beside
the plough to gather up his courage a little. A strange sensation that
he could not explain had taken possession of him, a feeling as if the
hope of his life was cut off. The pain was gone, but the feeling of
helpless surrender remained. He opened his shirt and passed his hand
along his breast. He could feel nothing,--could see nothing; but he had,
for all that, a clearly defined consciousness as of some deadly thing
hold of him that he would fain be rid of.

He had chanced to stop his plough under an elm-tree, and, looking up, he
perceived that fr