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who was a powerful fellow, and had been severely bruised in the struggle, he reared and plunged violently, and finally, breaking away, dashed round the circle, out at the entrance, and away up the road. The man firmly believed that Dandy had seen the ghost, which was now mentioned for the first time, although my views inclined to accept the occurrence as an outcropping of the original sin of the horse family.

The pursuit of a runaway horse is a melancholy operation-his speed is so much greater than his pursuer's; his means of flight so much better than the latter's opportunities for stopping him; he has four feet to set against two, and knows so well how to use them; he has such unpleasant soundness of wind and limb, and such a raging devil inside of him, while the satisfaction of recovering ruined débris is so slight, and the mode of punishment so vague. I followed along as best I might, picking up a cushion here, a blanket there, the whip in one place, and the seat in another, inquiring of every one that I met whether they had seen a horse, and being invariably answered "that they guessed they had." It is enough to say that, after smashing every thing to pieces, tearing the body of the wagon from the wheels, tossing out what was movable, and ruining his harness,

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Dandy Jim became satisfied, and allowed a rustic to catch him.

Here was a pretty family horse-afraid of a ghost when all respectable families teach their children that there are no such things as ghosts; running away under supernatural, and without even the excuse of mortal, terror. I felt like shooting or selling -probably the latter, on economical principlesDandy Jim, but eventually concluded to repair, or, more properly, remake the wagon. I could only have sold out at a great loss-and I so rarely rode behind him.

Dandy had several peculiarities of temper besides his fear of ghosts. He did not like steam-enginesif he had known how many people they kill, he would have been entirely justifiable; so one day, when I was crossing the track after having been to make a visit to a friend-for no one visits on foot in the country --Dandy Jim saw the engine approaching. That was sufficient; he immediately rose on his hind legs and pawed the air. This might possibly have contented him, but the leather straps, which were not intended to stand such a strain, gave way, and the wagon came upon his heels. What then happened I do not precisely know; he seemed to fly; occasionally he would appear to rise above the trees, and

then to descend into the bowels of the earth; he leaped from side to side of the road with an ease and rapidity that would have shamed a well-practiced kangaroo; the wagon bounded after him like the tail to a boy's kite when the latter gets pitching about with the violence of the wind, while his heels played like flashes of lightning far over my head. Fortunately, a countryman ran to my assistance and held back the wagon, while another caught the horse by the head. I rewarded those men liberally. Now a family horse should not kick, nor plunge, nor rear.

Another of his peculiarities was a dislike to standing. He did not mind standing in the stable in the least, but when he was harnessed he expected to keep moving. I hardly drove him sufficiently to learn his eccentricities of temper, and on one occasion laid down the reins for a moment. He immediately started, and the reins slipped over the dash-board out of reach. Reader, have you ever experienced the feeling of being run away with--I mean, female reader-by a horse? If not, do not aspire to it. It is not pleasant. The motion is rapid, and perhaps exhilarating, but it is not smooth, and the mode of stopping is uncertain. There is little to do, and probably much to suffer, with a possibility of ceasing to be. Dandy, instead of being a family horse,

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ought to have been a race-horse; his speed was wonderful, though I forgot to time it. I held by the dash-board, and shouted "ho!" at the top of my voice. Evidently his knowledge of English was imperfect; he mistook "ho" for "go," and the more I shouted the faster he went.

Where we went, or how we went, I never knew. When I came to my ordinary senses, and escaped from what seemed to me like a blazing comet on a "bust," I found myself on the top of a pile of soft dirt-that species of filth that the farmers obtain in

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the city, and put on their lands to make vegetables grow. Although it smelled strong, and my clothes were seriously damaged, my body proved, on careful examination, to be unhurt, and my mental nature only badly scared. I concluded to sell that family horse. My prejudices and impressions were in this instance, as in all others, borne out by the result. I determined to wait, before I drove again, till I could drive my own private steam-engine, for, with good management, I believe steam-engines run smoother than horses.

It is hardly necessary to mention other peculiarities, such as an insane desire to eat me up whenever I passed near his head, in entire disregard of the fact that Nature had not made him carnivorous, and an equally intense wish to kick me with his heels whenever I passed by his flanks. These idiosyncracies prevented my visiting the stable frequently, while our out-door acquaintance he had made short, and not sweet. Fortunately, he was lame most of the time, and when he was not lame he wanted shoeing, so that the family were not able to risk their lives unreasonably often.

All this while the pig had been quietly feeding and growing; in fact, a pig is a very different sort of animal. A pig never runs away and smashes wag

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